Aontú launched its pre-budget submission today in Leinster House.
Speaking at the launch of the submission, Aontú leader and Meath West TD Peadar Tóibín stated: “The Aontú pre-budget submission is focused on helping families and lowering food and fuel prices. Middle Ireland is suffering at unprecedented levels. Many families are working all the hours they can, or earning two good incomes and yet they still can’t make ends meet. Older people are being crucified by high energy costs. Farmers who make our food are seeing input costs increase radically and their business become unviable. The government is the author of much of these cost pressures. The government is pushing up food prices through excessive fuel taxes.
Today Aontú has delivered a highly-innovative pre-budget submission. We have introduced the idea of dynamic fuel pricing – when petrol and diesel prices rise above €1.90 a litre, carbon tax will be removed on a cent per cent basis. This will stabilise the price of petrol and diesel and help families across the country.
We are told carbon tax is to incentivise people to move from carbon fuels to sustainable fuels. If the international market price does this anyway, there is no need for the carbon tax. Our plans also mean that when the price of home heating oil and agricultural diesel increases above €1.15 per litre, carbon tax will come off. This will help those in fuel poverty and will reduce inflation on food. Aontú will not reinstate the excise which was cut from petrol and diesel, while the price remains above €2 a litre.
The government want the country to shift to electricity as an energy source, yet we have the highest electricity prices in Europe. Aontú seek to end the ESB dividend to the government for 2027. This would cost €150m. It would reduce the cost of a family’s electricity bill by €100 a year. Aontú would cut VAT on electricity from 9% to the EU minimum of 5% while electricity prices remain high. This will cost an estimated €85m a year and should remain in place for a year. Many families have now insulated themselves from electricity and fuel prices with EVs and Solar panels. But they are still too dear for most people. Aontú would double the solar PV grant (€1,800 to €3,600), double the EV purchase grant (€3,500 to €7,000) and provide a €600 battery grant for homes.
On tax, Aontú would end the USC on the first €25,000 of income. This would cost about €830m in year one. Aontú will increase the Family Care Credit to €4,000 allowing more parents who wish to stay at home and mind their children in the first few years to do so. Aontú would also create an additional second rate of child benefit that would be means-tested. This additional payment will benefit 100,000 children. This will cost €168m.
Another key difference between Aontú and the political establishment is the focus of Aontú in ending government waste. Aontú would cut out waste by €1bn in 2027. We would ensure that new contracts of all senior civil servants would include a clause that states that there would be penalties up to and including being fired if they significantly waste taxpayer’s money.
We would also nominate a Junior Minister for Efficiency whose job it would be to track expenditure in real time and report it weekly to the Taoiseach. This would place responsibility for waste in the Taoiseach’s office. We would end the dependency on external consultants by reducing payments to them by €200m. Aontú would audit NGOs. Those that simply lobby government on government policy and provide no other service to the general public would have their income cut. There is also a large level of duplication. In 2027 Aontú would cut funding by €300m.
Under our submission, we would end Military Expenditure to Ukraine by €100m. We would reduce Administration Staff within the HSE by 400. We would also reduce Agency Staff in the HSE. Aontú wants to see reduction in compensation. This will be a outcome of increased accountability. It would save the state €100m a year. Aontú will introduce a stricter immigration system with an asylum appeals court, a single Border Agency, enforced deportations and lower accommodation costs. This would save €200m. We would doubling the bank levy: from €200m to €400m, provide a Large Energy User Levy on data centres raising about €77m to €153m and we would end default school meals in Non DEIS schools, saving of €230m.
As part of our Operation Shamrock, we will bring home essential workers by offering them a competitive offer of a €12,000 grant each to come back and stay in Ireland. It is one of the most heartbreaking things in society to see some many young people forced to emigrate.”
READ OUR PRE-BUDGET SUBMISSION HERE.
For more information, contact Larissa Nolan, Aontú national director of communications on 087 799 64 23.
