Ahead of next Tuesday's budget, trade unionists, pensioners, students, people with disabilities, housing activists and many more will meet on Saturday at 1 p.m. at Parnell Square to march to Leinster House. They will be marching because they are being absolutely crucified with the cost-of-living crisis and the housing and accommodation crisis. Mortgage holders are paying thousands of euro extra in interest. Hundreds of thousands of householders are in arrears with their energy bills. Families are hammered with childcare costs. Renters are paying absolutely unaffordable rents, if they can even find a place to live. All this hardship and suffering is happening at a time when the Government has an unprecedented budget surplus, which is projected to be €16 billion next year, and the country is wealthier than it has ever been. According to the Central Bank, aggregate household wealth stands at over €1 trillion this year. Corporate profits have also nearly quadrupled in the past ten years.

Despite this, in advance of the budget the Government is playing down expectations, saying we cannot protect everybody against the cost-of-living hikes because it would cause inflation. I put it to the Tánaiste ahead of the budget that this is a false and dishonest narrative. First of all, it is not inflationary simply to maintain the value of people's income, it is not inflationary to keep people out of poverty and it is not inflationary to provide affordable housing. Second, the real problem the Government refuses to acknowledge is greedflation, that is, profiteering by the banks, the supermarket chains, the property developers and the corporate landlords. This is the problem. I will take just one example and ask the Tánaiste about it, namely, the inequality in the distribution of wealth. I mentioned that according to the Central Bank there is, for the first time, over €1 trillion in aggregate wealth in the country. The bank also helpfully set out the distribution of that wealth earlier this year. Does the Tánaiste know what it found? It found the richest 10% of people own 54% of all that wealth. This means 10% own €540 billion more than all the rest of society, the other 90%, combined. That is the truth. That is why the Government will not give people what they need to address the suffering, the hardship and the housing crisis. The Government is protecting a tiny few who have all the wealth and all the profits. Will the Government introduce a wealth tax in order to fund the affordable housing we need, address poverty-----

I thank the Deputy.

-----and fund our public services to redistribute the wealth that exists in the country and give it to the many and stop protecting the few who control all that wealth?

First of all, I dispute the Deputy's presentation of the facts, or the facts as he puts them and the position he is adopting here. The Government is very committed to protecting people against the cost-of-living increases. Last year we provided €12 billion to cushion the impact of rising prices on households, businesses and farmers. The Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, which I note the Deputy did not quote, found that once-off measures announced as part of budget 2023, combined with the core increases, insulated most households from rising energy prices last winter. The lowest four income deciles were cushioned against the inflationary spiral last year by the measures we took, namely, the combination of core social protection measures, public service pay agreements, tax relief and the once-off payments. These are ESRI data, not my data. It is our intention in this budget to continue to cushion people because next year, living standards will rise above inflation. Inflation is on a downward trajectory over the next 12 months and when the various measures we will take with pay, tax relief and so on are combined with that, it is our projection living standards will increase.

The Government's commitment is to a fair budget. It is fair to workers. We need to be fair to those who are out there working through the tax measures we will adopt and other supports we can and will provide both in terms of a once-off cost-of-living package married to measures for those on social welfare - protection measures to enable them to come through this winter. There is no question certain prices are high and people are under a lot of pressure.

We have record investment in housing. We have very high revenues coming in. They are tapering a bit. That is not Government cushioning or managing expectations, as the figures speak for themselves with respect to corporation tax. We still have very healthy corporation tax and healthy income tax coming in. These are all signs of a buoyant economy, because we have full employment. I suggest respectfully the measures Deputy Boyd Barrett is proposing more generally in the economy would, over time, undermine the employment story in Ireland. He is anti-enterprise, clearly. He does not believe in a free market economy. He does not believe enterprises should make profit. I am talking even about small- to medium-sized companies.

I thank the Tánaiste, the time is up.

Most Irish small- to medium-sized companies want to engage in free trade, but the Deputy is against it. His policies would undermine the enterprise economy-----

I thank the Tánaiste, the time is up, please.

-----that has resulted in very high employment in the country, and career progression.

What I do not believe is that in one of the wealthiest countries in the world it is acceptable for us to have record numbers of families and, worst of all, children living in homeless accommodation. I do not accept that a whole generation of young people are being crucified with unaffordable rents and can never hope to own their own home. I do not accept that there are now more than 250,000 people in arrears with their energy bills because of energy price hikes. I do not accept that 17% of the population suffer deprivation. I do not accept that workers have lost about 10% of their income in real terms because of cost-of-living hikes while the corporations have seen their profits quadruple. The ESB made €679 million in the first six months of this year, which is double what it earned two years ago. The banks are recording extraordinary profits and as I said figures from the Central Bank show the richest 10% of our population own more wealth than everybody else.

I thank the Deputy.

Is the Government going to address that inequality? Is it going to use-----

I thank the Deputy, The time is up, please.

-----the wealth that exists in our society to protect working people-----

Please.

-----pensioners, students and the least well-off from the hammering they are getting from the cost-of-living crisis and address the housing disaster?

We addressed the cost-of-living issues last year in an unprecedented way and in a way no other government in Europe did, with respect to the scale of the intervention. There were a whole range of measures, double social protection payments and all of that. We spent €12 billion last year alone and we are going to take similar action this year in the form of interventions to protect people, and it is our view that living standards will improve in 2024. The Deputy needs to acknowledge, notwithstanding his different political ideology, which he is entitled to, that we have 2.64 million people working today. Our economy added nearly 90,000 jobs over the past year for a total of more than 500,000 since we entered Government in 2020. The share of people who have jobs is at a record high of 74% with unemployment at an exceptionally low rate of 4.2%. Youth unemployment is the lowest on record and among-----

I thank the Tánaiste.

-----the lowest in the European Union and our population rose by nearly 100,000 people over the year to the end of April 2023.

I thank the Tánaiste, the time is up.

That is an alternative-----

Thank you.

-----and there is much more I could say but we are committed in the budget to protecting people, especially those on the lowest incomes, from the very significant and acknowledged pressures of cost-of-living increases.