Sinn Féin knows that no Government can protect everybody fully from every price increase, but we believe that more can and should be done by Government. And more would be done by a Sinn Féin Government.

Households are under serious pressure with the cost of living crisis, and ordinary workers and families need a break from these spiralling costs.

The cost of household energy has rocketed, with more than 50 different price increase announcements from Irish energy suppliers over the past 18 months. Average annual electricity bills have risen by some €1,200 since summer 2021.

A Red C poll earlier this year found that 37 percent of people have cut back on essential heating and electricity use and 17 percent have cut back on other essentials such as food. The Society of St Vincent de Paul saw a 49 percent increase in the number of requests for help with energy costs in February 2022, compared to the same period last year. And energy poverty projections from the ESRI in July 2022 indicated that almost 70 percent of people could be plunged into energy poverty.

Some of the cost of living pressures faced by the public are driven by factors outside of the Government’s own hands e.g. war in Ukraine, Brexit, global supply disruptions.

However, other factors heaping ongoing pressure on households pre-date the war, and are entirely of the Government parties’ own making e.g. house prices, rents and childcare fees.

All of these pressures must be responded to by Budget 2023 and serious headway must be made towards making basic essentials affordable for workers and families next year.

Sinn Féin priority measures include:

• Putting one month’s rent back into renters’ pockets and ban rent increases for three years – cost €302.9 million
• Cutting electricity bills back to summer 2021 levels and keeping them there until the end of February 2023. For details see page 14 – cost €700 million in 2023
• Cutting childcare fees for parents by two thirds – cost €179 million
• Increasing the minimum wage by €1.40
• Cutting USC to give workers back €300 – cost €629 million
• Increasing working age weekly social welfare rates by €17.50, pensions by €15 and €17.50 for those living alone, disability-related payments by €20, increases for qualified children by €5 and €3 for over 12s and under-12s respectively – cost €1.29 billion
• Abolish student fees commencing with a reduction of €1000 and increase SUSI maintenance grants by 25 percent compared to 2020/21 levels – cost €57.7 million
• Support businesses with rising energy costs through a combination of subsidies and loans – cost €225 million additional Exchequer funding in 2023

Sinn Féin has a fair and deliverable plan to tackle climate change that will ensure meeting our climate targets goes hand in hand with delivering a more secure and affordable life for workers and families.

We recognise that the causes and effects of climate change are not equally shared, with the top 10 percent of the Irish population by income level emitting nearly as much consumption emissions as the bottom 50 percent.

Indiscriminate carbon taxes not only place a disproportionate burden on those for whom alternatives are either unaffordable or unattainable, but fundamentally fail in deterring the greatest emitters. Our plan takes the opposite approach. By increasing and redirecting state investment, we will ensure that ordinary workers and families can avail of the alternatives and the benefits of a just transition.

Whereas the Government’s climate approach to ordinary workers and families is defined by punitive action, Sinn Féin believe that affordable and attainable alternatives should come first.

Government policy remains insufficient and at times contrary to its climate targets – their approach to data centres is a case in point. Of all EU member states, Ireland has been reported to have the third highest Greenhouse Gas Emissions per capita. If every state followed the policy trajectory of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party, the chances of keeping global temperatures below 1.5°C would have dissipated.

Our proposals will fundamentally reform how retrofits are funded, targeted, and delivered. In Budget 2023, we would invest €480 million – an additional €150 million compared to the 2022 allocation by Government for retrofits – for residential and community retrofit schemes.

Under the Government’s retrofit programme, many households can only access support for a decent home energy upgrade if they have €25,000 on hand – this locks out low and middle income households while giving those with money more money for a more comfortable home.

Sinn Féin propose an entirely new approach. Across our retrofit schemes, public funding will be proportionately allocated based on household income, so that those least able to afford home energy upgrades and most at risk of energy poverty are given the greatest levels of support.

Sinn Féin also propose to allocate the necessary resources to accelerate the transition to renewable energy, in a manner which maximises energy security and affordability for individuals and communities. Poor policy choices and failure to invest by successive Governments has meant that unlike Denmark, Ireland failed to transform our immense natural resources into national wealth.

This failure to realise the potential of our own wind and solar resources and consequent failure to reduce our dependence on imported fossil fuels at pace also left us excessively exposed to the negative impacts of energy crises arising from global events that are out of our hands. From increasing funding in community- owned renewables to improving the affordability of solar PVs for households, our proposals would ensure that our citizens and communities retain the benefits from our natural wealth, both in the long and short term.

The Covid-19 public health crisis demonstrated what can be achieved when everybody pulls together. Climate plans pursued by Governments will only work if they are experienced fairly.

The punitive and regressive carbon tax, which punishes those least able to afford their basic energy and fuel bills most, is felt all the more painfully when the wealthiest in society flaunt their climate-destroying lifestyles. From pollution taxes on private flights to wealth taxes, Sinn Féin will instead tackle excessive carbon pollution and its underlying root in inordinate inequality.

We need a new Government to change the focus from aspirational climate targets to real, fair, and ambitious climate actions. This will only happen with a Sinn Féin Government.

Sinn Féin priority measures include:

• Investing to accelerate the transition to renewable energy including through resourcing the planning system to speed up the development of offshore wind generation, putting solar panels on school roofs and enhancing grants to support those on low and middle incomes to install them on their homes – cost €44 million
• Making the temporary 20 percent fare reduction on public transport permanent and extend it to commercial operators, and reducing fares for children by 50 percent throughout 2023, accelerating the roll-out of the Connecting Ireland rural bus scheme, expanding school transport capacity and phasing out fees permanently – first year cost €160 million
• Imposing a Pollution Tax on private jets with a levy of €3,000 per departure – raises €18 million 

Sinn Féin would reset relations between the public, healthcare workers, and the State to place dignity, respect, and fairness at the heart of healthcare.

The cost of living crisis is compounding the health crisis. The burden of healthcare on households, including visits to GPs, cost of hospital stays, and prescriptions is felt all the more heavily when energy and food bills, rents and mortgages are rocketing.

The lack of affordable housing is also a major barrier to the recruitment and retention of staff in our health system.
The crisis in healthcare shares similar causes with the housing crisis. Both are a result of a failure in planning and a failed ideology which has damaged public services.

The Sláintecare consensus has failed to deliver meaningful change for workers and families because it is a myth. There is no consensus. The current Government parties have failed to implement Sláintecare because they do not believe in it. They view healthcare as a privilege for those who can afford it not as an equal right for everybody.

This is holding up the radical change needed to deliver universal healthcare with free GP care and short waiting times.
Sinn Féin’s priority in health is to deliver an Irish National Health Service which ends the two-tier health system and delivers timely health and social care on the basis of need, not ability to pay.

We would significantly cut out-of-pocket costs for healthcare from inpatient charges to prescription drug costs. We would make immediate expansions and investment in GP access and primary care staffing.
We would plan on a multi-annual basis to deliver a universal health service within 10 years. That will require substantial investment in hospital capacity, community capacity, primary care capacity, digital transformation, specialist services, and training the future health workforce.

In 2023, a Sinn Féin Government would invest more than €1.1 billion in new measures towards an Irish National Health Service. This is comprised of an additional €657.8 million for current expenditure measures and €461.7 million in capital or one-off spending.

This €1.1bn is for new measures over and above provision for outstanding Budget 2021 and Budget 2022 measures, NDP commitments, and other pre-committed expenditure items relating to pay including the latest deal currently under consideration by the trade unions, demographics, carryover, ELS, and other non- pay pressures.

Sinn Féin priority measures include:

• Funding an expansion of GP Visit Card eligibility to provide free GP care for additional 300,000 people – cost €40 million
• Reducing other costs of healthcare by capping monthly drugs payments at €70, abolishing prescription charges, removing inpatient charges over two years, and reducing and capping car parking charges for patients – cost €94.8 million
• Expanding acute hospital capacity including more than 500 hospital beds, 37 critical care beds, a 10 percent expansion of theatre capacity, and 150,000 diagnostic scans – cost €313 million
• Establishing a clear, multi-annual strategic workforce plan across the health and higher education sector to expand healthcare degree places by 1,500; increase medical specialist training places by 10 percent; expand GP training places by 20 percent; and expand training places for advanced practice and specialist nursing as well as clinical, counselling, and educational psychology – cost €21.8 million (Health) and €9.3 million (Further and Higher Education)
• Investing in a significant expansion of mental health services to deliver early intervention, out of hours, and emergency services – cost €81.6 million
• Funding the recommendations of the Disability Capacity Review out to 2032 – cost €152.7 million
• Through these measures, expanding the healthcare workforce across primary, community, and acute care by 5,000 workers next year

Sinn Féin would cut childcare fees by two thirds, putting money back into the pockets of hard-pressed families.

The rising prices of some things are outside of Government control, however, the sky-high prices of others, like childcare, are of their own making.

Delivering affordable childcare should be an urgent priority for Government because it is one area where immediate action could be taken to tackle the cost of living crisis.  Unfortunately, the Government has previously made glossy announcements for childcare which have only served to disappoint families as they fail time and time again to deliver fairer fees.  It is time to deliver real change for families.

Sinn Féin’s proposals will deliver affordable, good quality childcare, well paid careers for highly qualified professionals and sustainable services.

We would cut childcare fees by two thirds to make childcare affordable for parents.  This can be done.

Parents’ are currently spending approximately €400 million on childcare fees.  We would provide two thirds of this [€270 million] in additional public investment on condition providers reduce fees for parents by two thirds – one third in 2022 and one third next year.

Reducing parents’ fees by one third for the remainder of this year would cost €134 million for 2023.  However, we propose a second one third fee reduction in September 2023 which would cost a further €45 million.  The annual cost of a full year of the two thirds reduction is €270 million.

We would offer childcare facilities the option of entering a scheme where the state provides additional funding to cover some of the costs currently covered by parents’ fees, such as wages or overheads. In return, providers would reduce fees for parents by two thirds over the next two years. This would be guaranteed under legislation.

This would make a real difference for families’ finances and ensure they get a much-needed break from the cost of living crisis. Full-time childcare fees are on average €810 per month per child and even higher in parts of Dublin. For example, for an 18-month-old child in creche full-time in Dublin, our measures would reduce their fees by €6,639 per annum.

Sinn Féin priority measures include:

• Cutting childcare fees for parents by two thirds – cost €179 million in 2023, full year cost €270 million