Government must leave the pre-budget kites at home and get down to fixing our problems
Labour finance spokesperson Ged Nash has called out Government for it’s drip feed of what’s amounts to election messaging via the Budgetary process.
Speaking in Leinster House today, Deputy Nash said:
“Every year the tiresome pre-Budget kite flying gets earlier. It’s time this outfit left the kites at home and fixed the problems we have now and in the short time it has left.
“The shift to a focus on the tax cutting agenda is an admission that the conservative coalition has failed on housing and on care. They have managed to make this rich country feel so poor for far too many of us.
“Fianna Fáil look set to use the next few months to start pre-Budget kite flying, using their spell in Government to test key messages and develop manifesto points on the airwaves.
“This is a reaction to the ‘temporary Taoiseach’ in effect setting up FG general election HQ in Government Buildings.
“In May of last year when three Fine Gael Minister’s of State wrote an opinion piece for the Irish Independent calling for dramatic reductions in income tax, they were heavily criticised by Fianna Fáil backbenchers and the Minister for Finance Michael McGrath
“Ironically now, Fianna Fáil have used the media space around their Ard Fheis to propose tax reductions.
“The last time Fianna Fáil were in government, we routinely had two budgets a year when the country was in a the depths of a financial crisis due to their mismanagement of the finances.
“Fianna Fáil might take the advice they gave to their erstwhile coalition partners last summer. The prudent thing to do would be to stop insulting the intelligence of the Irish people, keep Budget negotiations off the airwaves, and stop trying to bribe the public with their own money in the run up to a series of elections.”