SINN FÉIN LEADER Mary Lou McDonald called for government to deliver a €500 USC tax cut for every worker and €400 worth of electricity credits in an “emergency budget”.

McDonald set out the party’s calls in her leader’s address at the party’s Ard Fheis in Belfast this evening.

Among the other cost of living measures, she called for a “substantial cut to excise” on fuel to make it affordable, including the complete removal of carbon tax on home heating oil and green diesel. 

A €500 cost of disability payment and additional support for social welfare, pensioners, child benefit, and fuel allowance were among the proposals McDonald set out for an emergency budget.

“There must be immediate relief for taxpayers, for working people,” she said, hitting out at USC as “the Fianna Fáil tax introduced when they crashed the Irish economy”.

She said the recent fuel protests weren’t solely centred on rising fuel costs, but spoke to further discontent with affordability in Ireland.

“Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael believed they could buy-off workers with half-measures, that they had subdued the ordinary people of Ireland. They were wrong,” she told attendees.

She hit out at the British government’s lack of intervention in cost of living in the north.

“Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are very concerned by all of this. Now, not sufficiently concerned to challenge the British government who hold the purse strings. Or to confront the economic vandalism of partition,” she said.

“But very concerned to have a go at us.

“So, for clarity agus mar eolas daoibh, Micheál agus Simon. We take no lecture from you, who believe Ireland stops at Dundalk. No lecture from you, who abandoned the six counties for over a century.”

Neutrality

Sinn Féin Vice President Michelle O'Neill and President Mary Lou McDonald speaking at a press conference outside the ICC hotel in Belfast where their Ard Fheis is taking place earlier today. Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie Leah Farrell / © RollingNews.ie / © RollingNews.ie

Another key issue raised in McDonald’s address was Ireland’s constitutional commitment to neutrality.

She said Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are “hellbent” on dismantling Irish neutrality and scrapping the triple lock. She said this is something the Irish people “want no part” in and won’t stand for.

“Micheál Martin and Simon Harris, I challenge you to put your plan to scrap the Triple Lock to the people,” she said, also urging the passing of the Occupied Territories Bill in full.

A white paper on Irish unity was also called for – which the party has been pushing for to take place by 2030.

Government may have survived Sinn Féin’s motion of no confidence, McDonald said, but in the process it lost a minister and TD in the two Healy-Raes. Her party will continue to put pressure on government, she stated.

She received a standing ovation from party delegates.

This morning, McDonald denied that her leadership is under threat or that she has lost the grip over her party.

She said she will lead the party into the next general election and that she will remain on as leader if her party loses out in both by-elections in May.