Barry Ward

But you know, Richard, that we are not entitled to unilaterally impose sanctions on Israel.

And if we could, I believe we would have, because we have talked about this.

Who's going to take a case against us?

Who's going to take a case against us?

The European Commission could take a case against us for starters, Richard.

Well, the first thing is about the desirability of it.

This has been Fianna Gael policy for a long time, and we have made reductions in terms of income tax in previous budgets, not the last one.

But it is really important because as we face into a cost of living crisis, the best way to deal with that is, in fact, to put money back in people's pockets wherever possible.

And I will disagree with Barry on this.

I don't think we pay low average rates.

In fact, we pay much higher rates of income tax, both at the average income and the higher income across the OECD and across the EU.

At the average wage, and remember, people in Ireland come into the top rate of tax, as Barra says, much earlier than other countries.

But if you take the average wage, we are 21% of income here compared to 15.5% across the OECD and 17% across the EU.

So we are higher.

But we are talking about income tax and how much that takes out of people's ability to run their daily budgets.

And what I'm saying is all of the criticisms that have been made of the government in recent times in relation to the cost of living, and it is huge and we know people are struggling, the very best way you can deal with that is by putting money back in people's pockets.

And that's what Fine Gael has been saying for a very long time and has done whenever it has been possible to do so.

Well, no, primarily the top rate first because the difficult... And in fact, what I would like to do first is change the bands in relation to the top rate of tax because that way you stop hitting the average earner.

So you hit the average rate of income in Ireland.

You're already into the top rate of tax.