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Tax cuts no alternative to pay rises
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| IMPACT’s outgoing president Kevin O’Malley. |
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IMPACT’s outgoing president Kevin O’Malley has rejected the idea that tax cuts can be an alternative to pay increases as Ireland comes out of recession. Speaking at the opening of the union’s conference in Killarney earlier this month, he said focussing solely on tax cuts would mean more cuts in public services and leave taxpayers subsidising low-paying but profitable employers.
Kevin said income restoration was now IMPACT’s top priority after six years in which living standards had been “battered” for all but a small elite. “You cannot restore living standards without restoring incomes, and that means pay,” he said.
He said Ireland already collected less tax as a proportion of GNP than most EU countries. “Employers’ organisations are telling us that pay must stay static while taxes fall. That would mean working people trading any sort of income recovery for worse public services, while profitable businesses and their shareholders make no contribution at all,” he said.
Late last year official figures showed that almost 90,000 employees were receiving jobseekers’ benefits because their pay was too low or their working hours were too few, while over 40,000 working families were receiving family income supplement. The number of public servants who receive family income supplement (FIS) has increased by 32% since 2008.
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