Kenny: Reduce number of TDs by 20

The number of TDs should be reduced by 20, according to Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny who said he was “deeply concerned” about proposals in the Bord Snip report to cut social welfare payments by 5%.

Mr Kenny said the membership of the Dáil could be reduced from 166 to 142 based on present population figures, but said it would depend on the results of the 2011 census.

Speaking to reporters following a speech at the MacGill Summer School in Donegal, Mr Kenny did not give his views on proposals in the Bord Snip report to cut the dole and other welfare payments. “I’m not looking at that now at all,” he said.

“What I am saying clearly is that the way you deal with the social welfare problem is that you invest in job creation and job protection.”

But earlier, during his speech to the summer school, he said: “We are deeply concerned at the idea of social welfare cuts when so many other areas of public expenditure remain untouched and unreformed.

“Investment in job creation and job protection is the answer to rising unemployment, but this is unachievable right now because of the paralysis in a government who remain transfixed at the continuing bank crisis,” he said.

Mr Kenny said the Bord Snip report by economist Colm McCarthy will “prove useless” unless it is accompanied by a jobs stimulus package.

“While the McCarthy report is a very valuable contribution to the national debate, I think we also need to be very careful about assuming that it is the only way forward,” he said.

The Snip report examined the number of TDs, but did not recommend a reduction because the savings from such a move would not be significant in the overall budgetary context.

Mr Kenny said a review of the number of TDs would be part of Fine Gael’s “comprehensive agenda for a new politics in Ireland.”

He said: “In due course I will appoint a transition team to oversee and plan the commencement of effective work for the next government. As Taoiseach, I intend to be the enforcer of government decisions and policy ... The ministers who don’t measure up will be moved on and ministers who abuse their positions will be dismissed.”

In a speech to the summer school, FG’s spokesperson on Energy, Communications and Natural Resources, Simon Coveney, accused the ESB of making electricity cheaper for small businesses by increasing the price for households.

“ESB’s response to high electricity prices for business is to ‘rebalance’ electricity prices in favour of business. They want to reduce prices to business by increasing them for households. I’m happy to consider any proposal but remain to be convinced that households should have to have an increased price burden to give business some relief.”