Budget bites

“TODAY’S budget is crafty, it’s a cunning budget. It’s been designed to push the right buttons. It’s a budget pretending to say sorry we messed up but everything now is changed, we are a reformed group”.

- Fine Gael finance spokesman, Deputy Richard Bruton.“It doesn’t live up to the hype, does it?

There’s precious little here to take the taxpayers on modest incomes out of the top rate of tax. This is a budget of goodies, not of strategy. It is a populist budget, not a visionary one.” - Labour party finance spokeswoman, Deputy Joan Burton. “I would have been better off sending our reports and data to Santa. The Government does not take sexual violence seriously.” - Rape Crisis Network Ireland director, Fiona Neary. “This is a Minister for Finance who is beginning to point in the right direction but would have to produce a half dozen of such budgets before he begins to repair the damage his Government has caused since 1997.” - Green party finance spokesman, Deputy Dan Boyle.