A FINE GAEL minister says the Social Democrats are “selectively” quoting comments by Simon Harris on the jobseekers’ allowance, as his party continues to get flak for them.

At Leaders’ Questions in the Dáil today, Peter Burke stood in for the Tánaiste, which meant he was faced with questions and criticism about Harris’s views.

Eoin Hayes, the Social Democrats social protection spokesperson, said the government is “distracting the public” from its “failures” rather than tackling poverty.

At the Fine Gael ard fheis last weekend, Harris said: “The dole is a safety net, not a way of life.”

He warned that “for those who refuse to engage, there will be penalties.”

The comments, according to Hayes, were “utterly deplorable”.

Today he raised the case of a homeless constituent who was abused as a child, entered foster care and struggled with addiction in his adult life due to his trauma.

“Is his way of life worthy of your contempt and your party leader’s contempt, or our society’s compassion?”, Hayes asked the employment minister.

Burke said Harris was clear that “when life takes an unexpected path for people”, they deserve support.

His party’s view is that social welfare should not be an “employment policy”.

“It should be a safety net that we should work with people to ensure that those who are long-term unemployed are getting every assistance from the state, that they can get into employment, and not leave them on the margin of society,” Burke said.

“It does a great disservice to anyone in long-term unemployment to take the view that nothing more can be done, society can’t do any more, governments won’t look there.

“We will absolutely look there, and we look there to ensure that we get people back into the workforce.”

He added that Fine Gael is “rewarding work”.

Hayes told Burke: “You don’t really get it.”

“What taxpayers really expect is a government that actually tackles problems instead of being epic wasters who can’t deliver basic services,” he said.

Hayes brought up the cost of the National Children’s Hospital.

Burke said he was being “disingenuous”, and that he was taking one line of a speech out of context.

He later said he doesn’t want Fine Gael to be categorised as a party that “punches down on those who are unemployed”.