(Members of the Reform Alliance – Terence Flanagan, Billy Timmins, Lucinda Creighton, Peter Mathews, Denis Naughten, Fidelma Healy-Eames and Paul Bradford – on Saturday morning at Buswells Hotel, Dublin)

What do they want?

Your dole.

And stuff.

[Lucinda Creighton] ‘We have probably the most generous welfare system in Europe,’ which is discouraging people from seeking work, and creating

‘Of course, the welfare system is very necessary and we are all in favour of helping the needy and the vulnerable, but all reports have pointed to the distortion of our system’ she says, adding that is it ‘crazy and unfair that people can be better off on welfare than working, or that they can be restricted from working further hours, because they would lose some benefits’

As for Minister Burton’s defence of the welfare system as an ‘economic stimulus’, Creighton said that this totally misunderstands what a stimulus is. ‘You create growth by creating jobs and building companies. Welfare is sustained from taxes and we are heaping people with ever greater taxes. We have to do more to support those who are creating jobs, like SMEs and not indulge those who are content to keep people on the dole’

As for public sector salaries, Creighton believes that all increments should be frozen, across the board. ‘Anything else is acting as if the crisis hasn’t happened.’ To backslide on fixing our finances would be a major mistake and we should hold to the 3.1bn figure. She points to Latvia which entered a much harsher IMF programme a year before Ireland did but which has now come out of it, because they took all the harsh IMF medicine up-front.

Harsh.