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Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton Laura Hutton/Photocall Ireland

"Are things tough? Yes they are" - Burton on Budget 2014

In an exclusive interview with TheJournal.ie, the Minister said that “we’ve tried to do what we’ve had to do in a very, very fair way”.

DRAFTING IRELAND’S ANNUAL budget is a “tough experience”, Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton has said – and the discussions on next year’s budget will be difficult.

In an exclusive interview with TheJournal,ie, she said:

This will be my third budget, and it’s – put it this way – a tough experience.
But the discussions will be difficult. But certainly last year and the previous year I was able to persuade people and got the support of my colleagues in cabinet to take a reforming approach to social welfare which also maintained basic incomes from social welfare

She would not be drawn on the specifics, but said she will be “going through all of the figures in great detail”. “And I think as well, my colleagues will recognise the reforms in social welfare, the success in getting people back to work.”

She said that pulling very large spends out of the Irish economy would make deflation deeper.

Europe

Burton recently wrote a piece for the Guardian newspaper with László Andor, Pervenche Beres, Yves Leterme and Henri Maloose. “Basically saying that Europe as a whole, not just Ireland, has to reflate its economy and it has to get people back to work,” is how Burton put it.

Europe has faced crises before, like the time of the great recession and economies recovered when people got back to work and banks began to function properly in terms of giving credit to businesses. So the budget discussions will take place against a backdrop of Europe’s dawning realisation that, hey, austerity is not the only way.

“There is a rethink going on,” said Burton.

Last year her department overshot its deficit target, and Burton said she doesn’t know what the outcome will be this year. “We have to be cautious and careful,” she said. “We are hoping to be able to go back to financing ourselves on the financial markets at a reasonable price.”

So we are making progress slowly but we need a European economy where Europe itself invests in economy and if it does then that will be a really positive backdrop to Ireland recovering.

She said that “what people want is fairness and what they want is to ensure that particularly people with broader shoulders would bear more of the burden. But of course the people with the broader shoulders and the money, they often are the people to say ‘why me?’”. Of the budget cuts, she said:

In fact, we’ve tried to do what we’ve had to do in a very, very fair way.

Defaulting

Burton pointed out that she was one of the people who strongly opposed the bank guarantee: “I just thought what we did was an incredibly expensive way to go about something that was going to be very expensive anyway”.

I think we ended up costing ourselves probably twice or three times as much as it should have cost us because a bank collapse is never cheap in any country.

She said the level of social welfare abuse “is relatively low” but that in a budget of €20 billion, even 3 per cent of people abusing it amounts to millions of euro.

She has been trying to send out three messages around social welfare:

  • Let’s get people back to work.
  • Let’s ensure that we protect core payments.
  • And lets make sure that the system doesn’t allow people to abuse the system and scam it.

Jobs

(Thejournalvideo/YouTube)

Minister Burton had strong words to say about new jobs being created in Ireland, saying that as they arrive here, she wants “that the focus is equally on people in the live register”.

One of the thing that upsets me as a minister, is that sometimes people don’t see the resource that the live register is of our fellow citizens. And if we could get more people who are on the live register taking up jobs that are being announced, well then social welfare would come into balance itself.

She said that she has been very careful as a minister to do a lot of reform, and the fact this is being done on less money “is a significant achievement”.

I think we’ve done and we achieved a lot of good work. However we still have a problem with the banks, we still have a problem with people who are indebted. And in terms of my own portfolio, on a weekly basis I see the figures, the 290,000 people who are not working at all, and who want to work. And that certainly inspires me to do the job with all the determination and whatever capacity I have to bring to the job.

Read: Welfare, health and transport cuts confirmed in revised Budget figures>

Read: Joan Burton no longer believes in austerity>

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26 Comments
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    Mute Paul Gibbons
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:41 AM

    The next general election will be tough too Joan…

    169
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    Mute John Mcfall
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:59 AM

    They are not helping people get back to work.the only reason the number signing on is lower is because of emigration.i had to leave the country to find work leaving my wife and kids behind.thats one of the hardest things I have ever done or will do.those idiots in the dail sacrifice nothing.we the people take all the hits.

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    Mute Declan Conway
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    Jun 10th 2013, 12:02 PM

    Too true.

    “She said the level of social welfare abuse “is relatively low” but that in a budget of €20 billion, even 3 per cent of people abusing it amounts to millions of euro.”

    Last week World Bank figures on remittances showed tha Nigerians in Ireland sent back 490 million euros to Nigeria – that’s 26,000 euros for each Nigerian man, woman and child in the State.
    However, children are ineligible to work, so the figure is close to 40,000 euros.
    But wait, Nigerians also have the highest rate of unemployment in the country than any other group – 45% (Lithuanians are second at 25%) – so the actual figure is more than 55,000 euros sent to Nigeria each year.
    Most Nigerians are working in unskilled, low-paid jobs.
    Monies sent from Ireland by foreign migrants are three times higher than the amount of money being sent home to Ireland by the Irish abroad.
    World Bank statistics show that Irish people living in other countries sent more than $750 million (€560 million) back home in 2011, but foreign workers here sent remittances of $2.4 billion (€1.8 billion) home in the same year.
    Wake up, Joan.
    Quickly.

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    Mute Adam Power
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:38 AM

    I think we’d all have a different outlook to these budgets if those writing them up took a significant pay cut and led by example. I’m talking knocking 80k a year off their wage slips.

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    Mute Vincent Dolan
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:43 AM
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    Mute Leonard Washington
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:48 AM

    Poor Joan, she hasn’t got a clue who is even writing the budget coz it sure isn’t noonan. Wonder if the furer over in Germany is telling her to give all these “exclusive” interviews with the journal?

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    Mute Sean Mac Gabhann
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:39 AM

    Why oh why are you giving her airtime. Her village is missing her…..

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    Mute James Brown
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    Jun 10th 2013, 7:23 AM

    Labour must finally be looking at the polls. Local elections coming up so they send out Joan the Moan to spew out her usual drivel.
    Hell, if you throw enough mud at the wall some of it will stick, or as we’ve witnessed over the past couple of days, if Joan starts commenting on everything, then maybe we’ll actually believe some of this tripe.

    At the last General Election I was foolish enough to believe your ‘bile’ & actually gave Joan my first preference vote, a mistake I can gladly say will never happen again. As soon as Labour got into bed with their counterparts in Government, they turned their backs on the very people who voted them in.

    In saying that you have done one good thing whilst in power & I thank you for it.

    Thank you Joan for showing me the error of my ways. Roll on 2016!!!

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    Mute Kay Mooney
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    Jun 10th 2013, 6:58 AM

    What a lot of hot air

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    Mute marty
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    Jun 10th 2013, 8:34 AM

    Things won’t be tough in her house. An overpaid ministerial salary will make sure of that.

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    Mute Kerry Blake
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    Jun 10th 2013, 9:20 AM

    Tough experience Joan? Possibly you should try living as those who your decisions effect for a couple of months. Tough experience my arse. Silly minister.

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    Mute Stephen Murphy
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    Jun 10th 2013, 8:57 AM

    The rich and wealthy won’t feel the pain, you can count on that!

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    Mute Mike Clinton
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    Jun 10th 2013, 8:12 AM

    “Hard decisions and trying to be fair’. .. Roll on the next elections .
    .

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    Mute Gar74.
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    Jun 10th 2013, 8:08 AM

    Ah Aoife my morning was going so well until about 2min ago when I read the headline and then saw the sour frown on Burton.

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    Mute Sean Duffy
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    Jun 10th 2013, 9:38 AM

    Let them know how you’s all feel when the next election comes around

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    Mute BadDrivingIreland
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    Jun 10th 2013, 8:19 AM

    Clueless woman.

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    Mute Steve Hardy
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    Jun 10th 2013, 7:06 AM

    She is my third favourite Burton.

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    Mute PADDY
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    Jun 10th 2013, 11:30 AM

    whats she moaning about sure the lads over in the european comission look after that for them now every body knows that , all you have to do joan is pretend that you have read it when they send it to you and your miserable party … lets be serious she’s not going to feck up her chances of jumping on the Mep gravy train to brussells by disagreeing with next years round of taxing the poor.. VOTE SF

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    Mute TheIrishBrain
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    Jun 10th 2013, 10:15 AM

    Labour no answers, no solutions, a spent force thats passed it best before date.

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    Mute Gis Bayertz
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    Jun 10th 2013, 12:14 PM

    Exactly! Hopefully they’ll go the same way the Greens did last time round

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    Mute Luke Pepper
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    Jun 10th 2013, 7:45 AM

    Bullshit they have…

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    Mute Gis Bayertz
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    Jun 10th 2013, 12:12 PM

    She and her colleagues don’t know what tough means – muppets, all of them!

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    Mute Sheik Yahbouti
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    Jun 10th 2013, 2:40 PM

    Not a tough experience for you, Joan, insulated as you are from a falling income (or no income) and constantly mounting taxes, levies and “charges”. The tough experience is for the generality of the population and you needn’t try and fool us into thinking you are agonizing over any of the “tough decisions”. How dare you? Your Government have had, admittedly little room for manoevre, but have consistently made the choices which would punish and disadvantage the ordinary working population – and the ‘vulnerable’ about whom you were so vocal in the general election campaign. If you think people are going to overlook that, you have another think coming.

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    Mute Jason Woodhouse
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    Jun 10th 2013, 9:46 PM

    All benefits should be slashed by 50%
    Unless you have worked to pay into it
    Personally if your long term unemployed 5 yrs or more you should be on side road cleaning in parks working cleaning beach
    You should not get benefit for nothing

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    Mute patjudge
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    Oct 12th 2013, 6:17 PM

    must be local elections coming up Joan THE MOAN, sure you dont have to worry about money, but dont forget the people dont forget the punishment labour imposed on its voters LIARS

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    Mute patjudge
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    Oct 12th 2013, 6:15 PM

    some neck

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