CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY
Thank you all for attending this morning.
I want to thank everyone who has followed our campaign. As we can see throughout the world at the moment, free elections are something that cannot be taken for granted.
They must always be treasured, and central to this is the need for an open and honest debate between those who are seeking a mandate from the public.
Fianna Fáil’s objective in this campaign has been to offer the people the chance to vote for a party which will protect and build on the progress our country has achieved.
A chance to vote for policies which will deliver sustained action on critical issues. A chance to vote for a positive agenda of progress for all in our country.
That is why at all stages of this campaign we have put policy before politics. We decided to publish our ambitious manifesto of 900 action points in the opening days of the campaign.
We did not hide our policies or drip-feed them in an effort to manipulate coverage.
And since then, every day we have talked about our programme of positive change.
A fair review of the campaign will note that every Fianna Fáil policy launch and every Fianna Fáil press conference was called to outline policy actions we want to implement with the people’s mandate.
In contrast, others have spent much of their time on negative attacks. This has escalated in recent days when they have seen how positively Fianna Fáil is being received in communities throughout the country.
I am not going to repeat all of the points we have made during this campaign, but I will say that we now have a clear choice to make on Friday.
Ours is a commitment to a government which can both protect Ireland’s economy at a moment of danger and deliver real progress on vital issues.
Our plans are detailed and more importantly they can deliver.
Fianna Fáil’s plan makes sure that we have the funds we need to pay public servants and maintain public services – and they build the reserves we created to make sure we can get through new challenges.
Fianna Fáil is the only party which not only provided significant tax and social protection support for families faced with high prices, but also set out a plan to get prices down in critical areas.
Fianna Fáil is the only party which has a credible plan and commitment to deliver on housing.
We’ve built 125,000 houses already, and 53,000 have been commenced in the last 12 months.
We’ve shown how to go further delivering the new homes which are the only real answer to helping people to find and afford a home to buy or rent.
Fianna Fáil is the only party which has set out a credible programme of ambitious investment and reform in our health services. Fully funded new services, expansion of GP care and a revolution in healthcare efficiency through digitalisation.
Fianna Fáil is the only party which has an extensive range of measures to make our communities safe and successful.
5,000 more Gardai. A radical reform of immigration and national security. But also, initiatives to invest in urban and rural communities – to revitalise their centres and extend the services they need.
Fianna Fáil is the party of investment in education – the only one with a fully-funded programme to reduce class sizes with a pupil teacher ratio of 19 to 1 and a step change in the funding of our schools.
And perhaps most of all, Fianna Fáil is the only party which has set out a detailed commitment to protect our core economic model, to stand with Europe at this testing time and to assert our values in the world.
The stakes in this election could not be higher.
Ireland faces the choice of moving forward with a positive vision of who we are and who we can be, or moving backwards with a negative vision which rejects everything our country has achieved.
A negative vision which wants to lead Europe in 18 months’ time and wants to undermine each of the fundamental policies on which we rely.
Throughout my time in public life and as leader of Fianna Fáil I have always valued the opportunity to meet with people throughout our country.
To talk with them about what they value and what they believe must urgently change.
Once again, over the past 3 weeks I have seen a country which has achieved a lot and has enormous potential.
There is no problem today that we cannot overcome, because we have overcome so many before.
I saw this as Taoiseach as we came together to get through the greatest public health threat of modern times.
To get through the fastest hitting recession for 100 years.
To cope with the fallout of war in Europe and rapid inflation.
Some politicians see problems and want to exploit them.
I believe in tackling them.
I am more convinced than ever that we can move our country forward together – and this is the message we are putting before the people on Friday.
-ENDS-