Most people across the country agree that last week's budget was deeply unfair and a very brutal one on the poorest and lowest income families. Today sees the commencement of the Social Welfare Bill. What has emerged from all of the disarray within Government prior to the formulation of this particular budget is the absolute determination of the Fine Gael members of Government to protect, at all costs, the wealthiest in society.

We were told over the weekend that the Labour Party members walked out of that fateful Cabinet meeting on the budget because of Fine Gael's insistence that welfare rates across 31 schemes would have to be cut if the universal social charge was increased. This has been leaked authoritatively by the Taoiseach's sources and Ministers. The Labour Party walked out at that moment against that insistence, but the big question is why it walked back in again.

No one walked out.

That is because they stayed bought.

Did it walk back in to add taxes on lower paid workers and cut child benefit, jobseeker's benefit and the respite grant for 77,000 people? In so doing it has broken every promise it made to the people of Ireland prior to the election. It is no wonder a newspaper columnist described it as a junta of Judases. There is a real sense of betrayal across the land given what has occurred. On Sunday the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Rabbitte, stated that Labour Party promises in advance of an election are always made to be broken.

The respite grant has been cut for 77,000 people. It is a slap in the face to these individuals and it undermines their value in society. Every Deputy in this House will say, either privately or publicly, that they would love to have that cut reversed because, on top of changes to home help hours, it attacks those with intellectual and physical disabilities, the frail and vulnerable elderly and those invalided at home, and it sends out a message that is appallingly mean-spirited and contemptuous. I ask the Taoiseach to agree with the vast majority of Members of from all parties in this House by, at the very least, committing to reversing this cut in advance of our deliberations on the Social Welfare Bill.

I would not believe all that I read in the newspapers.

I would not believe Time magazine.

The Deputy's acceptance of newspaper reports as the truth is far removed from reality.

I would not believe Fine Gael's manifesto either.

Or that of the Labour Party.

The position is that a number of weeks before the budget was presented by the Minister for Finance, Deputy Martin and others put forward the proposition that the old age pension was going to be cut-----

I never said that.

-----that the travel allowance was going to be cut, that the electricity allowance was going to be cut-----

It was.

-----and that the half-rate carer's allowance and the bereavement grant were going to go.

That was the Minister of State, Deputy Ring.

Please allow the Taoiseach to continue without interruption.

This budget is not about any particular party; it is about our people and our country.

Hear, hear.

The mess that was left for us to clean up requires difficult decisions that have an impact on people's lives. Nobody denies that, but the point is that we have to make choices in a situation like this because our country will never be right unless we put order on our public finances and restore our economy to good health. In that sense the Government set out with a deliberate decision to take more than €500 million from those who can best afford it. That will apply now and for the future. I think the Deputy shares that sentiment and he possibly expressed it.

I understand from speaking to carers that this is difficult. The point, however, is that the carer's package and the carer's allowance have been protected because we value what the carers themselves expressed in producing and publishing the report on carers and what they require earlier this year. As long ago as 2006, Deputy Martin's party in Government spent €128,000 on a report about this and then did nothing about it. The Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Kathleen Lynch, has worked assiduously on this since last year and, working with the carers' associations and groups, produced the fine report which we would like to see implemented, although, unfortunately, financial circumstances do not allow us to do everything we would like.

The carer's package and the home care package have been untouched. The carer's allowance is untouched. The question of the half-rate carer's allowance is untouched. The respite grant has been reduced to 2006 and 2007 levels. It would be nice for the Minister for Finance to stand up and have the opportunity on budget day to give out increased facilities for a range of sectors. That is just not possible. I accept it has an impact on a number of people but the vast majority of social protection allowances have not been touched. The Government focused on two areas in so far as social protection was concerned but our remit has been to protect the vast majority of the rates paid under social protection and the vast majority of the allowances and facilities that are currently available.

Another columnist this morning described the interview that the Taoiseach conducted last Wednesday evening regarding the budget as "a stream of banal inanities", a "crumbling of language" and a load of "inarticulate drivel". I would not apply all of that to what the Taoiseach has just said but I would apply it to the initial part of his response.

It sounds more like Deputy Martin.

We did not predict anything that he suggested. At exactly this moment last year, he reversed the budget decision on the disability allowance and DEIS schools. The Minister for Education and Skills apologised for his attack on carers. He has yet to apologise to the students of Ireland but at least he apologised to DEIS schools for his attack and he reversed that measure. A majority in this House want the respite grant cut to be reversed. The Taoiseach can reverse it and even a marginal increase in the universal social charge would enable him to do so. However, he seems determined to continue on and suppress dissent, as is evident in the ramming through of this measure this week with the guillotining of the Social Welfare Bill and, on Friday, other measures. He appears to want to hammer Labour Party backbenchers into submission. Why is he doing this? Is it to protect the highest paid in the land? That is what he has leaked across the board. To protect the highest paid in the land he is prepared to stand over this and he will brook no dissent from Labour Party backbenchers or anyone else.

One would think Deputy Martin was not in the previous Government.

We are now over time. Will the Deputy adhere to the Chair's ruling?

He is parading around as some sort of new Ireland chancellor, determined to get his way and giving in to nobody.

The Deputy has learned nothing from being in Government.

I urge the Taoiseach to stand back, reflect on his decision and reverse this cut because it sends out a message that the budget is mean-spirited and shows utter contempt for those who care for the less well off and most vulnerable in our society.

The Deputy could refer his words to his own actions, with his inarticulate drivel and his untruthful and hypocritical comments about the property tax, which he signed up to but does not want introduced yet. In the middle of a children's referendum he circulated leaflets in his constituency stating it was the wrong time to do something he signed on for and designed himself.

Hear, hear.

As I pointed out, the carer's strategy was agreed and published by the Minister of State at the Department of Health in conformity with what the carers themselves expressed as the principal issues.

On the respite grant.

The estimated expenditure in 2012 on carers is more than €771 million, with €509 million being spent on carer's allowance, €24 million on carer's benefit, €135 million on the respite care grant and €103 million on the domiciliary care allowance. That represents an increase of more than €20 million on expenditure in the carer area compared to 2011. More than 51,000 people receive the carer's allowance - which was not touched - of whom almost 22,000 get the half-rate carer's allowance in addition to other social welfare payments at an annual cost of €90 million. More than 1,600 people receive the carer's benefit and the numbers in receipt of carer's allowance have increased by more than 150% over the last decade, from 20,000 in 2001 to 52,000 in 2011. Expenditure on the carer's allowance scheme has increased by more than 220% over that period.

Over the decade.

I do not accept the Deputy's question about unpicking elements of the budget. His attack on the Labour Party is utterly hypocritical and opportunistic. He is under pressure from his colleagues on the far side of the House.

Is that the note from the Minister, Deputy Rabbitte?

He chose to pick on the Labour Party.

The poor Labour Party.

The budget presented by the Minister for Finance is not about the Fine Gael Party or the Labour Party; rather, it is about Ireland and its people.

It is about protecting the rich.

It was the Taoiseach who leaked it. He told the journalist.

It is about the Government having the conviction and the courage to clean up the inordinate mess left behind by the most incompetent, out of touch, arrogant Government of the past 50 years.

Surpassed only by the Government.

We will do this, taking into account the circumstances in which so many find themselves. People all over the country say to me that they know difficult decisions must be made in the interests of all the people.

Sarah Palin would not be a patch on the Government. Fine Gael is the Tea Party.

I would love to be able to say to the Deputy that instead of cuts in this area, the reverse will happen, but that is not the case. The budget is about freeing the economy and opportunities for the many hard-pressed middle income families who will never get out of this rut unless the Government makes hard decisions in the interests of all the people and the country.

Never, not with the way the Taoiseach answers questions.

Blame the Labour Party when it is on the backs of carers. Is that it?

It ill behoves the Deputy to attack the Labour Party, in particular, as if the budget belongs to it.

The budget is about the people and the country. We will stand over it and attempt to implement these decisions with care, compassion and consideration and in the best way possible.

The Government drove a stake into the heart of the Labour Party.

We have protected the majority of allowances paid under the social protection code. I have given details of the increased figure of €20 million and indicated where it will be spent next year.

We had the most regressive budget last year and again this year.

Things are bad now.