Conor Sheehan

Good morning, David, and a very good morning to your listeners.

Delighted to join the panel.

Well, I think the government has chopped and changed its positions more times than I can think of in the last couple of weeks.

We're very clear that what needs to happen is that we need a mini-budget because workers and families are at the pin of their collar at the moment.

particularly PAYE workers who haven't gotten any support from government in any of the packages that were announced for the fuel and haulage sector and we were also very clear about how we would pay for this we would

we would essentially cancel the very expensive and untargeted hospitality VAT cut, which was a Fine Gael wheeze in the last budget.

But people can't simply wait until the budget.

My clinics are full of people coming to me every week who can't afford groceries, can't afford heating, can't afford their electricity bills.

Well, the hospitality sector is a sector that keeps adding jobs quarter upon quarter and the fact of the matter is that the thing is totally untargeted.

So the likes of McDonald's and Starbucks and big, very profitable fast food chains are getting the same support as the smaller indigenous cafes and bars who might actually need it.

Well, I suppose we would introduce, first of all, a windfall tax on energy profits.

We would introduce targeted energy credits.

We would introduce a one-off €100 grocery supplement to child benefit and we would restore the €100 that was cut.

from the back-to-school clothing and footwear allowance.

And we would also increase the bank levy to £500 million to pay for this.

I mean, we were the first party to call for a mini-budget, but there are other parties who have subsequently joined us in that call.

But unlike others, we are very clear about what we would cut in order to pay for these measures.

Well, what we're proposing would actually give families and workers across the country relief in this unprecedented cost of living crisis.

And we have very clearly set out what we would cut in order to pay for that.

So we're not talking about just pumping money into the economy willy-nilly.