Labour Party leader Ivana Bacik is dismissive of the outgoing Government’s pre-election giveaway budget with its litany of one-off payments. She describes it as “a sort of glitterball budget, lots of shiny things for people, but nothing sustainable”.
Bacik says Labour welcomes “any alleviation of pressures on households” but says one-off payments are “simply not sustainable as a way of addressing a cost-of-living crisis”.
Last week’s Irish Times/Ipsos B&A poll shows that cost of living was identified by 30 per cent of respondents as the issue that will have the most influence on their vote. So what is the Labour Party offering to win over such voters and make things a bit easier for struggling households?
Bacik cites a promised rent freeze for tenants, €50-a-week childcare per child, and the roll-out of free GP care for all children under 18 among measures Labour would take to address the cost of living.
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She says that “on the broader level” Labour is proposing the indexation of tax bands and social protection payments “so that people’s incomes will be protected”.
Labour has promised to reform the annual budget process and to provide for the automatic increase of income tax credits and bands as well as social welfare payments to beat inflation.
Bacik said inflation has negated wage increases people have received in recent years and “knocked out” one-off welfare payments. She added: “We’ve seen auction politics to a large extent in these sort of one-off payments, and people talking about USC [universal social charge] cuts. Let’s look actually at how we can protect incomes in a planned way, a way that doesn’t leave households struggling.”
According to Bacik “it’s about delivering security for people”.
It would be a radical reform and one that would not necessarily be acceded to by potential coalition partners whose focus may be on more traditional budget-day tax cuts and welfare increases.
So would it be a red line issue for Labour in government formation talks?
Bacik says: “It’s been an absolutely core priority for us now in successive alternative budgets that we’ve presented.”
However, she also says: “I don’t like talking in terms of red lines...I mean I’ve always been about constructive politics, about looking at what we can do to deliver change for communities. So to start laying down red lines and specific issues, I don’t think is helpful at this point.”
Bacik has said the first thing she will do after the election is to contact the other smaller centre-left Green Party and the Social Democrats to seek to negotiate entry into government from a “position of critical mass”.
Wouldn’t it make sense for the larger parties to seek to pick off smaller centre-left parties as possible coalition partners rather than negotiate with a bloc?
Bacik insists Labour is “absolutely not about going into government to make up numbers”. She said it has “huge differences” with the three biggest parties, and that the pathway to deliver change is through “a common negotiating bloc with others who share our vision and our values”.
Bacik said her party would go into any programme for government talks on the basis of the “six missions” it has set out in its manifesto on housing, the cost of living, climate, work, health and childcare.
Labour had seven TDs in the last Dáil. Bacik argues “there’s a momentum with us”, and says “we’re confidently predicting we’ll have an increase of seats”.
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