Shock for consumers and business. Low paid and elderly will be hit hard.

Fine Gael Communications & Energy Spokesperson, Leo Varadkar TD, today (Sunday) said a hike in electricity prices in October will horrify consumers and businesses and hit the low paid and the elderly particularly hard.  Deputy Varadkar has called on Minister Ryan to postpone the introduction of a €156 million levy, which will see household bills rise 5% and small businesses pay €100 more on annual bills, and instigate a full review of the levy used to subsidise peat and renewable energy generators.

“The news that electricity prices are due to rise from the first of October will come as shock to hard-pressed consumers and businesses.  The levy is particularly unfair to the low paid and elderly people as it is imposed as at flat rate on all domestic consumers regardless of how much energy they use.  A granny living on her own using very little electricity will pay the same amount as somebody who leaves their boiler on all day.

“Businesses will be horrified to see electricity prices going up again.  We already have the third highest electricity prices in the Eurozone and now they are set to rise further.  I think people will be particularly angry that the ESB will be the main beneficiary of levy and will get €85.5 million from it in a full year given that the company reported profits of over €500 million only last week.

“Responsibility for this price hike lies firmly with the Minister Eamon Ryan.  The Regulator’s only role is calculate the levy based on his policies.  Consumers and business are going to have to pay the bill for Eamon Ryan’s green energy revolution and his unwillingness to squeeze the ESB.

“I am calling on the Minister to introduce a statutory instrument to postpone the introduction of the levy, which will be imposed in October, pending a full review of the levy.”

It’s simple: the Minister and his colleagues are out of touch

It speaks volumes for the disdain with which the Government views the taxpayer that a Minister sees fit to splurge thousands of Euro of public money by using both the Government Jet and his Ministerial vehicle to attend the McGill Summer school, according to Fine Gael Spokesman for Communications and Natural Resources, Leo Varadkar T.D.

“It cost €55 me for a return ticket to Donegal airport to speak at the McGill Summer School, Glenties while it costs the taxpayer €7,890 to keep the Government Jet in the air for an hour. Minister Dempsey added insult to injury by also sending his Ministerial car ahead to Derry, incurring yet more costs for the taxpayer and proving just how out of touch he is with the financial realities people facing on a daily basis.

“Minister Dempsey and his colleagues don’t pay tolls, book flights on-line or undertake the day to day tasks ordinary taxpayers are faced with. It is quite simple, the Minister and his colleagues have lost touch with reality.

“It is no surprise then that Government policy consistently fails to take account of the real hardships real people experience every day. An additional 1,700 people are signing on every week according to the most recent figures, and yet the Government has no jobs strategy to deal with a jobs crisis that is removing hope from the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.”

Fine Gael TD for Dublin West, Leo Varadkar has welcomed an agreement between the HSE and the Daughters of Charity Service (DOCS) which will allow for the reinstatement of most of the respite and other services for the intellectually disabled that were closed last month.  This follows a vigorous campaign against the cuts led by the families and parents of the service users which was supported by opposition parties.  The campaign involved public meetings, lobbying the HSE and public representatives and large protest outside the Dail.  The HSE imposed cuts of more than 9% (€4 million) on DOCS in Dublin which was much greater than cuts imposed in other areas. 

Even after implementing the pay cuts and meeting the 2% efficiency savings target, there was still a shortfall causing frontline services to be reduced.  Under pressure from the campaign, the HSE agreed last week to reduce the cutbacks by €1 million thus allowing Ard Cuan and the Glenmaroon Day Centre to re-open and respite services to be reinstated albeit with a slight reduction in service levels.  No commitment has been given on funding for 2011.

‘I am very glad the HSE has relented and that most of the services that had been closed are being reinstated.  I would particularly like to congratulate the parents and families of the service users who organised and executive a brilliant campaign to have the worst of the cuts reversed.  I was happy that Fine Gael was able to assist them by attending the public meetings, raising the issue in the Dail during Taoiseach’s Questiontime and by visiting St Vincent’s Centre on the Navan Road with Enda Kenny.’

The Daughters of Charity is the largest service provider for people with disabilities in Dublin.  More than 1,100 people are cared for by the organisation including residential patients and people who live with their families and in sheltered accommodation.

Fine Gael TD for Dublin West, Leo Varadkar has called on the Minister for Finance to ‘come clean’ on METRO WEST and to say whether or not it will be built and when.  Metro West will run through the western suburbs of Dublin linking Blanchardtown, Liffey Valley and Tallaght.  It will interchange with Luas, Metro North and the existing suburban service in Dublin 15.  The project was included in the government’s Transport21 plan which was published before the last general election.  It was also included in the National Development Plan (NDP).  However, METRO WEST was left out of the €39 billion Capital Programme for 2010-2016 announced by the Taoiseach, Minister Lenihan and Minister Gormley last week.  The extension of the train line from Dunboyne to Navan and the Western Rail Corridor were also left out. 

By contrast, funding for METRO NORTH and DART UNDERGROUND was ring-fenced in the plan.  It seemed clear that METRO WEST was gone until Transport Minister Noel Dempsey went on radio to say that the Navan line would go ahead even though there was no budget for it and that planning and design work for Metro West would continue so that it could be built at some point in the future.

‘I think the Minister Lenihan really needs to come clean on Metro West.  Will it be built or won’t?  And if so, when and how much will it cost?’, asked Deputy Varadkar

‘I have always been a little skeptical about Metro West.  I think it would very expensive to build especially the new bridge across the Liffey Valley from Porterstown to Liffey Valley and I am not convinced that it would cover its own running costs.  It seems to me that projects like electrifying our existing train line and linking-up all the train and luas stations in town makes more sense.  However, nobody turns down a major piece of infrastructure in their own constituency.  But I would hate to see millions of euros and thousands of man hours wasted on a project that is never going to be built.  It’s time for Brian to come clean’, he added

Real figures show net loss of 9,000 jobs and lost opportunity to support 30,000 more

Fine Gael Communications & Energy Spokesman, Leo Varadkar TD, has described as ‘complete codology’ Government claims that the new capital programme announced yesterday would create 270,000 jobs.

“This year, the Government will spend €6.5 billion on capital projects supporting about 75,000 jobs mainly in the construction sector. According to the Revised Capital Investment Plan, €5.5 billion will be spent in 2011 supporting 66,000 jobs. That’s a net loss of 9,000 jobs.

“I have studied the Revised Capital Investment Plan in detail. The Government’s claim that it will create 270,000 jobs is based on the proposition that 12 jobs are created for every €1 million spent on infrastructure. That figure is valid. However, what they neglect to mention is that these are not additional jobs. These are jobs that will replace jobs lost on other capital projects that have been completed.

“The Government is trying to pass off a cut in the capital programme and a net loss of 9,000 jobs per annum as a boost for employment or some sort of ‘stimulus’ plan. This is ‘complete codology’.

“People working on the Dunboyne rail line this year will be working on the Metro or the Dublin inter-connector next year. People building new schools in one parish this year will be building a new school in another parish next and people who are working on the National Convention Centre now will be working on the new DIT campus next year. But overall there will be fewer of them.

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Leo visits Fintown Railway in Co. Donegal with Fine Gael by-election candidate Barry O’Neill, Dinny McGinley TD, Cllr Terence Slowey, Cllr Eithne Loftus and Cllr Kieran Dennison

Fine Gael has offered to advise the Government’s Review Group on State Assets in order to help Fianna Fáil and the Greens to implement this carbon copy rip-off of Fine Gael’s NewERA plan, according to Deputy Leo Varadkar TD.

The Fine Gael Communications Spokesman said: ‘It’s a pity the Government did not act when Fine Gael published NewERA 15 months ago, instead of waiting until the live register had almost doubled’.

“When we publish a policy, it’s rubbished by the Government. Then months or years later they realise Fine Gael was right, and they bring it in as their own policy and try to take the credit.

“It happened this week with the Government’s Home Defence Bill, a cause Fine Gael has been championing for years.

“And the Government has also ripped off our policies on benchmarking, the PRSI holiday for new jobs, the windfall tax on power generators, culling useless State quangos and reining in wasteful State spending.

“It’s happening again with the Review Group on State Assets announced by the Government this week. This audit of State assets is strikingly similar to NewERA, Fine Gael’s plan to overhaul Ireland’s infrastructure.

“Fine Gael launched NewERA 15 months ago. Our plan would have created more than 100,000 jobs in the short and medium term. Many of those new jobs would now be in place if NewERA had been adopted as Government policy at the time.

“Obviously I welcome the fact that the Government is now implementing NewERA, even if they have given it a different name.

“That’s why Fine Gael is offering to advise the Review Group. Since this is Fine Gael policy in all but name, we think it’s only right that Fine Gael brings the Government up to speed.”

A new survey showing that Ireland’s broadband is the third most expensive in the OECD rubs salt into the wounds of Irish customers, who already have the worst broadband service in Europe.

The National Competitiveness Council’s new report confirms that Ireland has the third most expensive broadband out of 28 OECD countries, with prices more than double the OECD average.

“This report adds insult to injury to broadband users. Not only do we have the worst broadband in Europe, but we have to pay some of the highest fees.

“This is having a serious impact on Irish businesses, who need a fast and reliable broadband service in order to compete internationally and to drag Ireland out of recession. Irish schools are also suffering from the appalling broadband service.

“Meanwhile, the UK and other EU countries are moving on to the next level of broadband provision with new, superfast services.

“Fine Gael’s NewERA policy sets out how Ireland can kick-start work on a fast, reliable and cost-effective broadband network. Ireland cannot compete internationally with a broadband network which is stuck in the last century.

“Instead of having the third most expensive broadband in Europe, with the worst service, I want Ireland to be in the OECD top five for speed and cost-effectiveness. It’s a shame Fianna Fáil and the Greens just aren’t interested.”

Speaking to the MacGill Summer School in Glenties last night (see script here), Fine Gael Communications and Energy Spokesman, Leo Varadkar TD, said that the ridiculous concept of Long-Term Economic Value should be abolished with regard to NAMA and the remainder of the loans to be transferred should be bought at market value.

Deputy Varadkar said:

“We are stuck with NAMA but there are certain things we can do to minimise the cost of the bank bailout to the taxpayer, restore public lines and improve credit lines to business.

“To begin with, we can still amend the NAMA process to remove the absurd concept of Long Term Economic Value. Only one-quarter of the loans that will be transferred to NAMA have been transferred. The remainder should be bought at their market value and for nothing more.

“Alongside this, the Government should publish the entirety of the Bacon Report which proposed the establishment of NAMA and all of the independent and other advice that they received at the time. We have a right to know what other options were considered and why they were rejected.

“We also need to ensure that the Banking Inquiry will look into the behaviour of the banks in weeks after the Guarantee was introduced. There is anecdotal evidence that Anglo Irish Bank used the cover of the Guarantee to engage in reckless derivatives trading and foreign currency speculation in a double or quits gamble aimed at minimising their losses. If these stories are true, the abuse of the Guarantee itself may have considerably increased losses at Anglo Irish.

“And the possibility that NAMA will have to be bailed out by the taxpayer also needs to be considered. In October, the Courts will hear Paddy McKillen’s challenge to NAMA. He argues that his companies’ loans are performing and that he should have to go into NAMA. The same case could be made by the 20% or so of developers whose loans are also performing. In the early years of its business plan NAMA will rely on income from these performing loans to cover much of its running costs. If the McKillen case is successful and performing loans are taken out of NAMA, we have to consider the possibility that the state may even have to bailout NAMA itself sometime next year.”