“It is time for better priorities. It is time for better choices, choices that are unapologetically about improving the lives of ordinary people. It’s time to put workers, families and communities first.”
From Sinn Féin
Sinn Féin Leader Mary Lou McDonald, speaking at the launch of the party’s alternative budget earlier this week, said: “Our primary 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. These are all measures that could and should be implemented by this government.”
Speaking from Dublin, Ms. McDonald said: “Today, we present Sinn Féin’s Alternative Budget for 2026. It is a budget to end the rip-off. It is a budget to support workers and families. This Budget comes at a time when the cost of living is sky high. It also comes when the Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael waste of public money is out of control. Households for whom every euro counts watch on as the government pours their hard-earned money down the drain. The examples of waste I raised in the Dáil this week alone would have paid for an SNA for nearly a hundred schools. So, there is a real life price to be paid for this waste and it’s paid by ordinary people.
“Workers and families deserve better. 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. While Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and their Lowry backers abandon ordinary households, Sinn Féin is fighting their corner. With our Alternative Budget, we are saying to workers and families, ‘we are on your side. We have your back’. The cost of living crisis is not over. The price of everything is going through the roof – 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.
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. Our cost-of-living package is about making life affordable when it comes to renting, childcare, energy bills, driving, education and groceries. It’s about making life fairer by scrapping the USC on the first forty thousand euros of income for every worker. We will also invest with real purpose to meet the big challenges of our generation. 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, friends, we will provide the funding necessary to plan and prepare for a United Ireland in our time. Tá sé mar sprioc againn an saol a dhéanamh níos inacmhainne. Buiséad é seo chun an saill a stopadh. Buiséad é seo chun tacú le hoibrithe agus le teaghlaigh.
When people ask – why is it that in a State so wealthy, nothing seems to work, the answer is found in the bad priorities and bad choices made by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael over the last decade and a half. They always prioritise those at the top, the powerful, the golden circle. They refuse to take on the energy companies, insurance companies and big supermarkets as they rip people off.
It is time for better priorities. It is time for better choices, choices that are unapologetically about improving the lives of ordinary people. It’s time to put workers, families and communities first. With this alternative Budget, we are showing that we have the political will to make life affordable for everyone. This is a budget to end the rip-off. This is a budget to support workers and families.”
Among our key measures:
- €450 of energy credits
- Putting a month’s rent back into your pocket and banning rent increases for three years
- €10 a day childcare
- Scrapping the USC on the first €40,000 of your income for every worker
- Fully abolishing student fees from September 2026 – starting with €1500 for the 2025 academic year
- A double child benefit payment
- Increase pensions and core welfare payments by €15 and €20 for disability
- Reintroduce the State Pension at 65
- Abolish the TV license
- Scrap carbon tax increases on petrol, diesel, home heating oil and gas
- Deliver 22,900 social and affordable homes
- 500 additional hospitals bed in 2026
- Commence the largest Garda recruitment drive in the history of the state – 1,000 new trainees
- You can read Sinn Féin’s alternative budget in full here.
- Mary Lou McDonald is President of Sinn Féin and a TD for Dublin Central- you can follow her on Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram and TikTok.
- This article is taken from Sinn Féin’s 3/10/2025 email bulletin.
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