Dundalk TD says Sinn Féin budget would ease cost-of-living pressure for Louth families

The driving aim of Sinn Féin’s Alternative Budget is “to make life more affordable for people, to ease the pressure on households hammered by soaring prices, and to invest with ambition for a better future”, Dundalk TD Ruairí Ó Murchú has said.

Speaking ahead of the government’s budget on Tuesday, the Sinn Féin spokesperson on disability said those with additional needs would see ‘significant investment’ in services and recruitment of staff, as well as a proposed €20 increase on the weekly disability allowance under his party’s proposals.

Deputy Ó Murchú said the Alternative Budget contains proposals to start a “strategic and sustained investment in disability therapy services as well as health and social care places in college over the term of a government.”

Sinn Féin’s proposals would also see an increase in the number of trainee educational and clinical psychologists, while there would be investment in special education teachers, SNAs and staff for Children’s Disability Network Teams (CDNTs) to ensure they are fully staffed.

Deputy Ó Murchú said: “Sinn Féin’s Alternative Budget is one to end the rip-off and to support workers and families. 

“Our driving aim is to make life more affordable for people, to ease the pressure on households hammered by soaring prices, and to invest with ambition for a better future.

“The cost-of-living crisis is not over. The price of everything is going up – energy bills, rent, insurance, childcare and groceries. This is why we are proposing a €2.5bn cost-of-living package to help people through the winter, to help households to get by.

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“We are combining targeted payments for those most in need with one-off measures to make sure help reaches everybody struggling to make ends meet.

“We will invest to deliver the affordable and social homes workers and families need, to build the health service people deserve, to shape a fairer, better society for disabled people, carers and for children. And we will provide the funding necessary to plan and prepare for a United Ireland in our time”.