For several months I have asked the Tánaiste to explain how families who have borne the brunt of the Government's austerity policies can pay the unjust and unfair water tax. I have asked her directly which daily necessities she proposes they forgo to prop up the discredited entity that is Irish Water. She has never once given me a straight answer. We now know the reason for her reticence.

All along she was planning legislation to pickpocket people's wages, pensions and social welfare payments. The proposal is low, sneaky and a cowardly proposition in the face of mass public opposition to her water tax. That such a Thatcherite policy is being introduced by Labour Party Ministers makes it all the more despicable. It illustrates the contempt with which Fine Gael and the Labour Party now view all of those on low incomes, the working poor, the unemployed and the vulnerable. It is an attitude best encapsulated by her colleague, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, who commented on unemployed citizens being, in his mind, allergic to work.

The Government is now seeking to turn private landlords into debt collectors for Irish Water, a position they greatly resent. As a result, landlords have speculated that they may have to triple tenants' deposits. The plan to raid people's wages, pensions and welfare payments will include thresholds to ensure people are not pushed into poverty. Those who cannot pay, and many of those who will not pay, already live in poverty. Is the Tánaiste not aware of that? They are barely able to make ends meet, but she just does not get it.

The Government now proposes to raid wages, welfare or pensions. In a double whammy, it also proposes to make private rented accommodation even more unaffordable for those with low incomes. Perhaps this time the Tánaiste will answer. What advice does she have for those people? What daily necessity does she propose they forgo to pay the water tax?

It is my objective, as Minister for Social Protection, as I have told the Deputy, to get as many people as possible back into work and thereby significantly improve their income and that of their households and to improve the life chances of any children they may have. The social welfare system in this country is strong and is built on social solidarity and a social contract.

A lot of people lost their jobs as a result of the disastrous crash in the economy, which was engineered by the previous Government. We want to get as many people of working age as we can back into work. That is not a difficulty because many people are anxious to return to work, education and training. Many young people are delighted to take up apprenticeships. From the manner in which the Deputy talks about people who rely on income from social welfare, one would think that such people had no ambition whatsoever in terms of opportunities for themselves or their children.

I have listened to Sinn Féin's mantra on social welfare and its hostility to work for so long that if it was a song we would all be able to sing it. No wonder west Belfast has the highest incidence of all the problems Deputy Kelleher was talking about as regards poverty and a whole range of social difficulties.

Why does the Tánaiste not stand for election there?

Whether Deputy McDonald believes it or not, people find value in life by participating in the community and particularly by being able to get well-paid work and develop a well-paid career.

I ask the Tánaiste to answer my question.

The Tánaiste is a waffler.

As regards this proposal in respect of civil debt, does Sinn Féin welcome the fact that when this legislation is enacted people will no longer be imprisoned for civil debt matters?

They will be imprisoned in poverty.

Deputies on all sides of the House have called for this basic reform over a very long period. Does Sinn Féin welcome it or not? It is a fundamental reform of how debt is dealt with.

The second thing about debt in a modern society is that it affects people at all levels of society. As we know from the crash, it is not just people on a tight budget who find it difficult to manage - lots of people do. The first thing with debt is to have easy methods of paying so that, as far as possible, nobody ever actually gets to a court and the debt can be dealt with. In the case of water charges and Irish Water, we reformed the system and the charges in such a way that many people who are now receiving their bills are finding they have beaten the cap because they have been very careful with their use of water. That is part of the reason we have put in water metering around the country.

My question has not been answered.

This is a Second Stage speech.

On the matter of debt, I cannot give the Deputy the kind of detail she is looking for because the legislation is being drafted as we speak. The Government made a principled decision yesterday evening to adopt broadly the reforms advocated by the Law Reform Commission in 2010 in respect of civil debt, particularly to distinguish between those who will not pay despite being on comfortable salaries but want everybody else to pay, and those who have difficulties with paying. There will be a very clear support system set out in respect of people who have those kinds of difficulty.

It is not me the Tánaiste has to convince of people's anxiety to get back to work. That is a conversation she should have much closer to home, primarily with her colleague, the Minister for Finance. I trust she will have that conversation with him and will ask him to desist from insulting and being condescending towards people who find themselves out of work. That would be at least one constructive thing that the Tánaiste might do. Her comments set aside entirely the reality of the lives of people on small fixed incomes for whom the quarterly payment of €65 is simply beyond their reach. What is absolutely beyond me is the fact that the Tánaiste, as a Labour Party leader, and her colleagues on the Labour Party benches do not recognise that reality. A bill of €65 might seem like a small sum to all of us here, but when someone is stretching week after week and not meeting her bills, when her head is already below the water line, how on earth is she expected to get the €65 together? That is what this boils down to.

The Tánaiste says she took a principled decision on this legislation - my goodness, a principled decision - to put her hand into the pocket of a woman raising a household of small children who does not sleep at night with worry about how she will pay her bills.

We never left any mothers on pensions as widows. That was Deputy McDonald's lot.

Does the Tánaiste regard that as a principled position? It is a disgraceful thing to do, and none of her highfalutin' and condescending rhetoric can disguise that. People cannot afford these bills. The Tánaiste says she is acting on a proposal from the Law Reform Commission from a number of years back. That proposal does indeed exist, but the Tánaiste is not fooling anybody. This is all about Irish Water and the public resistance to an unfair imposition on struggling families. People see that this is the Government saying to the working poor - many of those struggling are at work, as I presume the Tánaiste knows - that it does not care about their living circumstances or their day-to-day struggles and that if they do not cough up it is going to stick its hand in their pockets anyway. That is the message people hear.

A question, please, Deputy. You are over time.

The Tánaiste should answer my original question - not that it is terribly unusual not to get an answer. What does she say to that woman in that struggling household? What does the Tánaiste suggest she set aside to put together the €65? Is the Tánaiste happy to give her even more sleepless nights as she worries about how and when the Tánaiste's hand will be stuck into her pocket or her purse or when it will take bread off the table and from her children? That is the reality of the people I represent, and they want the Tánaiste to hear that message-----

I am calling on the Tánaiste now.

They want her to respond, if she would be so good as to give an answer.

Earlier on in her tirade, Deputy McDonald asked me whether I would have a conversation with Deputy Michael Noonan. I ask her if she has ever had a conversation with her party leader about various issues concerning him, or is she a coward? Second, in respect of some of the people sitting in this Chamber who have the honour to represent people in this country, our salaries and conditions are pretty good. However, there are a lot of people sitting here who have said they will not pay.

That was not my question.

That is the exact point.

They are not suggesting they cannot pay but that someone on a very handsome salary should get the compliant pensioner to-----

My question relates to a very particular section of society. Could we have the question answered?

The Tánaiste has the floor. We will deal with the question.

We have over 1.2 million people-----

The Tánaiste has no answers for those families. She is a disgrace.

Really?

Deputy Crowe, please. This is Leaders' Questions.

Sinn Féin Deputies changed their plan - they were going to pay at first, but they got a fright.

It does not matter whose questions they are. She is not going to answer them anyway.

I could have a discussion with Deputy Crowe about disgracing one's self any day of the week if he is prepared to talk about things. The issue is somebody who is well off and refuses to pay.

I have not asked about people who are well off.

What about those on the minimum wage? The Tánaiste cannot answer and will not answer.

Deputy McDonald has clearly had a chance to look at the Law Reform Commission report. The heart of that report is to distinguish between those who can pay but will not, and those who do not have the ability to pay.

I have not asked about people on big salaries.

The report sets out mechanisms and methods whereby people who cannot pay will be helped in dealing with debt issues.

Allow me to say one thing I regret about the water campaign-----

That the Tánaiste did a U-turn on imposing it.

The Deputy and her colleagues have an absolute right to campaign and march on the street at any stage. However, in the previous history of campaigns by ultra-left groups, the charges that ordinary people were subjected to have mounted up.

When those groups left and went to join another campaign those ordinary people were left to face those charges.

Can I expect an answer to my question?

They were your charges.

Please.

This has happened in campaign after campaign.

The Tánaiste is a great revisionist.

Many people in the House know about helping families who unfortunately ended up with serious debts. What this legislation is attempting to do, and what the Department of Social Protection is doing-----

What item should that woman and her family forego to pay your water tax? That was the question.

Please.

We are spending as a country on behalf of all the citizens-----

What item should that woman raising her children forego to pay your bill? Please answer my question.

Deputy, please.

What we are doing for that-----

The Tánaiste has the floor.

We are spending as a society almost €20 billion in respect of social welfare, and this money-----

What item does that woman forego to pay this bill?

-----or some of this money will go to the lady the Deputy has spoken about-----

And you will pickpocket her disgracefully.

-----and if she is relying on social welfare income she is getting very strong support from the State-----

She is not. She is being put under immense pressure by you. What item does she take off her shopping list?

The Tánaiste to conclude.

-----which also wants to help her back to getting employment.

You are dipping in their pockets again.

The Tánaiste to conclude. We are out of time.

Does the Deputy think-----

I think you should answer questions. That is what I think.

Will you be flying first class?

Do you think you are running some kind of a kangaroo court-----

No, I am questioning you.

-----and that you can just do a tirade?

A kangaroo court.

Ask Deputy Eric Byrne about kangaroo courts. He would know all about them.

You would know all about them.

Members, please. The Tánaiste to conclude.

When she goes for a monologue, as she is doing, it is difficult even to hear what the points in the monologue are. The Department of Social Protection-----

The point is very clear.

Cut it out.

The Tánaiste is concluding.

The question has been put very clearly and repeatedly and the people I represent, and that many others represent, want to hear an answer to the question.

We are over time.

What the Department of Social Protection does-----

Disrespecting the citizens.

-----for the lady and for anybody else in this situation is that we have a whole set of structures in place to support and help people-----

Can we have a half an hour? We are in injury time now.

-----with meeting their household costs and paying debts so they do not get mired in debt. We have a household budgeting system which helps a huge number of people through An Post. Many of the Deputies in the House are very familiar with it.

You have no answer.

Deputy Finian McGrath is sitting in the wrong seat.