Fianna Fail has just introduced the harshest budget in Ireland’s history. Many of your entitlements, and the amount of tax you will pay, have been substantially changed. This leaflet aims to provide you with a update on these changes and a detailed guide to this year’s budget.

Fianna Fail in this budget targeted families and the most vulnerable in our country including carers and the blind.

- A Cut in Tax Credits and a New Tax called USC of up to 7%

- Cuts to the Carer’s Allowance and Disability Pensions

- Child Benefit Cut

- Social Welfare Payments Cut by 4%

Fine Gael has a different approach; we proposed an alternative budget with a fair approach to tax and job creation at its centre. This budget would still enable us to tackle the economic disaster created by Fianna Fail.

- No Increase in Income Tax in 2011

- Closing tax loopholes for the rich, including suspending

property-based tax reliefs and tightening the rules for tax exiles

- Targeting the €3 billion worth of annual social welfare fraud

through the establishment of a single Payments and Entitlements system – Protecting pensions, including contributory and non-contributory old age pensions, those for widows, the blind, people with disabilities, and carer’s allowances, while collecting some extra tax from those with generous occupational pensions.  Fine Gael is committed to leading a government that will restore our economic independence, get people back to work and have fair taxes for individuals and families.