Barry Ward

speaker

554 appearances 6 recordings 2 series first heard Apr 2026 last heard 7 Sep

Barry Ward’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 6 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 2.

Appearances

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The Claire Byrne Show · Should there be a cut in the 52% marginal tax rate? · 11 May 2026 podcast

And in fact, link it to that, if that were possible.

Yeah, I was just going to say, Barra is right.

It's an expensive project, but it's a worthwhile project.

And it's not the case that it can't be done.

And remember, we've seen from past experience in this economy and in others, when you put money into people's pockets, it actually can end up generating money as well for the economy in other ways.

We also know that there are lots of people anecdotally in the economy who decide not to take that extra bit of work, that extra bit of overtime, whatever it is,

because it puts them into a higher tax bracket and the amount of it, over 50% that they pay in tax, makes it not worthwhile.

So it's also about making work pay and that benefits the economy in lots of other ways.

I am not disputing that it's an expensive measure, but in real terms, I think the 1.5 billion euro is bold because it doesn't take into account the other benefits that come to the economy, yes.

But I'm not saying it's not expensive.

I'm not saying that it isn't.

I don't see any politician... That's not a progressive measure.

I mean, we benefit from a hugely progressive tax rate in this country because it reflects people's ability to pay.

The more you earn, the more you pay.

And that's the way it should be.

We're one of the most progressive taxation systems in the world.

If you're talking about shifting that from income tax to property tax, then you're right, it will be much less progressive because it doesn't look like people's ability to pay.

There's two things.

Firstly, cutting the lower rate is actually more expensive because it affects everyone, whereas cutting the top rate is more doable.

Also, we talk about the top rate.

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