We have three boxing champions in the Public Gallery whom I wish to welcome and acknowledge. Amy Broadhurst is the International Boxing Association, IBA, light welterweight champion of the world, Dearbhla Tinnelly is the youth light heavyweight European champion and Evelyn Igharo is the current Irish elite champion at 70 kg. They are joined by coach Jim O'Neill from the Clann Naofa boxing club in Muirhevnamore in Dundalk. These women are trailblazers. They were around the House. Members met them and we were all a bit star-struck. Well done and keep at it. I also see some of the Muslim Sisters of Éire here. They are also most welcome. I thank the Ceann Comhairle.

There are just three weeks left in this Dáil term, three weeks for the Government to see sense and introduce an emergency budget to tackle the cost-of-living crisis. If the Government does not intervene now, many households will be pushed over the edge because they are on the brink today. They simply cannot wait for October for budget 2023. The crisis is getting worse, as the Taoiseach knows. Yesterday, the Central Bank of Ireland reported that one third of families are just making ends meet. This is up from one quarter of families in January. The supermarket analyst company, Kantar, has stated that the sharp increases could add €453 to the average annual grocery bill. Again, this is a jump of €100 on the company's estimate from last month.

Workers and families, as the Taoiseach knows, are finding it increasingly difficult just to afford the basics and are struggling to put a roof over their heads, food on the table, fuel in the car and clothes on their kids' backs. Esther Pugh is the manager of the Barnardos centre in Loughlinstown. What she told the media yesterday encapsulates the situation. She said:

... we would have children coming into the service wearing their pyjamas for day clothes, and specifically bought to be day clothes... The big worry is electricity running out - families don't have money to run their washing machine and tumble dryers.

[...]

I have worked in Barnardos for a long number of years and what I am seeing now is the kind of deprivation we would have seen back in the '80s. It is bad - there is no point saying otherwise.

These are heartbreaking words, as I am sure the Taoiseach will agree, and they capture everyday life for so many families now. We are now at a point where having a full-time job is not a guaranteed protection against the sharp edge of this crisis. Some households with two incomes are really struggling, so what hope and what chance do those on low pay have? We know that international factors are at play. We accept that. We also know, however, that this cost-of-living crisis is a catastrophe for our society. I have been contacted by parents who are worried that they are raising their children now for emigration.

I have been contacted by young people who do not want to leave but have their bags packed for Canada and Australia. They say they cannot afford a life at home. That is the terrible vista again of forced emigration looming for us.

Tá teaghlaigh i ndeireadh na feide. Anocht, iarrfaidh rún Shinn Féin ar an Rialtas buiséad éigeandála a thabhairt isteach. Ní féidir le hoibrithe agus teaghlaigh fanacht ar bhuiséad 2023. Tá daoine ag streachailt. Teastaíonn tacaíocht uathu anois. Tonight, Sinn Féin will bring a motion to the Dáil that will call on the Government to introduce an emergency budget to deliver and extend cost-of-living supports for workers and families. We should not have to bring this motion but the Government has buried its head on what is a state of emergency for households. I call on every Deputy to support this motion. I want all of us to work together to ensure that people get the relief they need so badly and as a matter of urgency. The truth is the Government cannot clock off in three weeks' time and leave families fighting to stay afloat. That would be wholly wrong. We need an emergency budget and the workers and families of Ireland need it now.

I join in welcoming and congratulating our boxing heroes, Amy, Dearbhla and Evelyn. Boxing has brought great honour to Irish sport throughout the decades and continues to do so. We pay tribute to the coaching fraternity and our boxing community. Well done to Jim O'Neill and his team. It is fantastic the degree to which young people are encouraged and nurtured through the great sport of boxing.

Like everyone in this House, we are deeply concerned about the enormous cost pressures and impact of the current inflationary cycle on people, households and workers. I make it very clear that the Government and I are absolutely determined to deal comprehensively with this. Putin has waged a war first and foremost on the people of Ukraine through ongoing murder and terror, as witnessed in yesterday's appalling and inhumane bombing of a shopping centre with 18 innocent civilians killed. In parallel with this, Putin has deliberately and premeditatedly created an energy war, an energy crisis, through withholding supplies, causing a massive increase in the price of energy across Europe and the world. Likewise, on migration, he is creating the worst humanitarian crisis since the Second World War through the terror of bombing towns and villages, forcing Ukrainians to flee their lands, with the internal displacement of about 7 million people. In addition, through the weaponisation of food, he is creating a famine to add to the challenges Africa is already experiencing. That is the context and background; it is a very real one. At the meeting of the Council of the European Union last week, very real concerns were raised about what the winter will bring if gas is cut off fully by Russia from the rest of Europe, particularly the major states that use Russian gas. That is now a very real prospect. That has already happened in quite a number of states.

This is not something we can chase month by month. There has to be a comprehensive response that gets us through the entirety of next winter in particular. It is a response that has to take on board pay. There have been discussions between public service unions and the Government. There have been settlements in the private sector in the past while and those will continue. In relation to that, tax has to be dealt with. The expenditure profile of every Department has to be dealt with, which is very much linked to the cost-of-living issue, in the context of issues such as childcare and health care costs and so forth. The idea of doing something in an isolated silo way is just not the correct response. It has to embrace pay, expenditure, tax and a specific cost-of-living package that would apply in this calendar year to meet the challenges people face.

It is wrong to say, as the Sinn Féin motion states, that the Government has done nothing or to condemn what the Government has done. The Government has increased the fuel allowance, for example, by 55% or €404. That is a measure we have already introduced.

About €2.4 billion in measures have been allocated to the cost-of-living issue. The Government cut taxes and increased social welfare rates in the budget last October. Since then, through measures in February and beyond, we have also reduced excise duty on petrol, diesel and green diesel, saving motorists between €9 and €12 each time they fill their tanks. We have reduced VAT on gas and electricity bills from 13.5% to 9%. We have also given a €200 energy credit to every single household across the country. We have cut the annual public service obligation, PSO, levy from €52 to minus €75. We have launched a national retrofitting scheme. We have introduced new grant rates that will cover about 80% of the typical cost of attic and wall insulation. We have put caps on school transport fees for families. We have cut public transport fares by 20%, with an additional 50% cut in fares for young people. We have lowered the threshold for the drugs payment scheme.

It is therefore just not fair or balanced to say the Government has done nothing. What we need is a comprehensive package, which we are working on and which we will deliver for people to alleviate the undoubted pressures that are on people at the moment and that will be there right throughout the winter.