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Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 22 Mar 2018

Vol. 966 No. 9

Questions on Promised Legislation

I ask Members to be concise so that we can give everyone a chance. I am obliged to call leaders or their representatives first.

I wish to ask about the Judicial Appointments Commission Bill, which has been described in today's editorial in The Irish Times as the pet project of the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Ross. I concur with that view. As the Tánaiste knows, Fianna Fáil is opposed to the Bill because it is fundamentally flawed, but if the Government is not going to listen to us, we are not the only ones who have concerns with it. The European Commission has expressed its concern that the Bill "would not be in line with European standards". The Tánaiste will agree that this comment is not insignificant. It cannot and should not be ignored. Is the Government concerned about the Commission's view and, in order that Ireland can meet the highest standards of judicial independence, will it reconsider this legislation, which is being driven by the Minister, Deputy Ross?

The question is in order, as it relates to the Judicial Appointments Commission Bill.

As the Deputy knows, the Bill is going through the system at the moment. It has been through Committee Stage. There are a series of issues with it, given its legal complexity and the amendments that have been made, some of which were supported by the Opposition and others of which were not. Of course the Government notes what the European Commission says. This is not driven by one Minister. This forms part of the programme for Government.

He would be better off concentrating on transport.

A decision has been made by the Government that we need to make a fundamental change in terms of judicial appointments. We must ensure that, on a new body that is set up to make recommendations to the Government, there will be a lay majority. That is not inconsistent with what many other countries in the EU have done, including our closest neighbours.

We must examine the precedent while also taking note of the comments of Opposition parties and the European Commission. We will have an opportunity to tease through those issues on Report Stage of the legislation.

Yesterday, the Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government heard legal advice from the Office of the Parliamentary Legal Adviser confirming that the Dáil vote in November did not constitute Oireachtas approval of the national planning framework. This directly contradicts the claims made by the Taoiseach and the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government in the House on 14 and 15 February. Sinn Féin believes that there must be a vote on the national planning framework, and we will submit amendments to the Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill 2016 to secure that vote.

When does the Government intend to bring the legislation back to the Seanad?

The legislation very recently progressed significantly in the Seanad. It is our intention that the Minister of State, Deputy Damien English, will bring the Bill back to that House as soon as the Seanad schedules it, at which time additional amendments may be dealt with.

Research published this week by the Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, showed that a hard Brexit would cost Irish people up to €1,400 per year, with lower income groups being most severely hit. The research is timely and shows the importance of east-west trade and the impact tariffs would have on food imports into this country, an area on which we have not focused greatly. There is still no certainty on how the backstop, with which I will not deal today, will function, or legal clarity in advance of the European Council. It has been reported that each Department has been instructed by the Government to prepare contingency plans and emergency legislation to deal with a hard Brexit. Has that been done? Will the Government publish the contingency plans and the heads of legislation being prepared in each Department to deal with a hard Brexit?

As regards the ESRI report, such reports are helpful, but they must also be put in context. The ESRI looked at a worst case scenario and outlined the possible cost to the citizens of Ireland.

We should all do so.

The Government is doing so. We are planning, as we must, for a worst case scenario, but we are also negotiating on a best case scenario. It is important that we do not allow a narrative to develop that this is the likely outcome of Brexit because that is not the case.

We all buy insurance, but we do not expect to become ill.

We must ensure we will prepare for all scenarios, as we are doing. We have asked all Departments to give us feedback on the preparations they believe are necessary to deal with the worst case scenarios. I am unsure if it would be helpful to publish that feedback which I have not yet read, but I am happy to brief other political parties on it. We must make a judgment call on what is helpful to be put in the public domain and what will contribute to a negotiating strategy for Ireland. I will happily tease through the issues in more detail at the stakeholders' forum or elsewhere with Members, if they so wish. We have published a series of over 20 reports. There is, therefore, no shortage of information available to the public. We must consider the details of the internal preparations being made by the Government because we have only just received the feedback from Departments and more work must be carried out by some Departments in that regard.

My question relates to the commitments in the programme for Government in respect of health care, to which the Tánaiste referred. There is a wonderful institution, St. Theresa's Hospital, in Clogheen, County Tipperary. A local committee and families whose loved ones died in the hospital have raised almost €500,000 and the Health Service Executive, HSE, is to contribute €400,000 or €500,000. However, we cannot get to have meetings or engagement with the HSE. The project has been left hanging for three years and different designs have been brought over and back. The hospital has an excellent staff and matron and is widely used by people from across County Tipperary and west Waterford. I ask the Tánaiste to drop into the hospital which is located not far from the motorway-----

Is this question about the programme for Government?

It is. The programme for Government contains a commitment to fund health care. This is a wonderful community facility which needs more space. The Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, is demanding improvements at the hospital. The project must be progressed to meet HIQA standards. We need action from the Government in that regard.

I think the Deputy is referring to a commitment in the programme for Government to fund health care services generally. He is probably stretching it a little. I cannot give him an answer about a specific project on the floor of the House, but I will ask the office of the Minister for Health, Deputy Simon Harris, to revert to him.

On page 127 of the programme for Government it is stated the Government will fund additional capacity to meet existing and future commuter needs. I remind the House that the Taoiseach was very keen to tell everybody that he had been responsible for Luas cross city, but he has not been seen during the chaos that has arisen since. The problems include timetable failures, chronic and dangerous overcrowding, the impact on commerce and a significant impact on journey times for Luas and Dublin Bus passengers, pedestrians and cyclists. Some 10,000 Dublin Bus passengers are discommoded daily as a result of route changes and electronic failures which resulted in the withdrawal of longer trams. The solution has been to take seven trams from the red line which serves the south side of the city and my constituency and transfer them for use on the green line. Can the Tánaiste guarantee the people of Tallaght, Belgard, Fettercairn, Citywest and other place on the south side of the city that there is adequate capacity on the red line to meet commuter demands, particularly at peak times? Does he accept that replacing trams on the green line with trams from the red line is not an acceptable solution to the capacity problem on the green line?

Is this question about promised legislation?

No legislation has been promised. Clearly, there are some teething problems, but-----

It concerns a commitment made in the programme for Government.

The programme for Government contains a commitment to invest heavily in commuter transport services and the Government is doing so. Clearly, there are management issues and teething problems------

Teething problems.

------on Luas cross city which have caused many problems for consumers.

These issues must be dealt with, but they are largely management issues for the operational company concerned.

I refer to page 108 of the programme for Government. Lyme disease is the world's fastest growing vector-borne infection. People all over the country, many of whom are radically debilitated and incapacitated as a result, are suffering from it. According to experts, some GPs have a poor level of awareness of the disease and its symptoms, as a result of which the disease is overlooked and misdiagnosed. Many have been left in limbo in terms of its diagnosis and treatment and forced to take on a large debt in order to travel to Germany to receive treatment. Will the Tánaiste release them from that limbo and ensure the proper treatment is provided for them in this country?

I will ask the Minister for Health, Deputy Simon Harris, to revert to the Deputy on that issue. It is a specific question about health services.

As regards the commitment in the programme for Government to rural and coastal community sustainability, I refer to the fishing sector, with particular reference to landings made by foreign trawlers in Irish ports. I have been told that the figure for total landings in Castletownbere, in the Tánaiste's county, in 2016 came to €111,000,000, of which 65% or €72,150,000 was accounted for by foreign trawlers. Up to 15 articulated lorries consistently collect fish on a weekly basis to take it out of our jurisdiction to be processed elsewhere. Can anything be done about the added value that would accrue from the construction of a processing plant? Such a plant would be of great benefit to local coastal communities such as Castletownbere, Dingle and others that are suffering.

The agreement made in principle this week on a transition period of almost two years after Britain leaves the European Union has provided reassurance for fishermen in Ireland that their access to United Kingdom waters under the Common Fisheries Policy will not diminish or change during that period. That is very welcome as there was much concern in the fishing community in that regard. We will have to wait and see what will happen after the transition period. That issue will very much form part of the negotiations.

As regards landings made at Irish ports by foreign and Irish vessels, it is important to point out that Irish boats also operate in the sovereign waters of other countries. Approximately 30% of our mackerel is caught in British sovereign territory off the north coast of Scotland. The point about the Common Fisheries Policy is that fleets move within EU waters and there is a mechanism that allows us to set quotas. Therefore, it is not necessarily a bad thing that foreign boats choose to land fish at Irish ports. They could steam elsewhere and land fish at other ports. The key is that we try to ensure Irish boats have the maximum number of fish available for them to catch in a sustainable way.

That is what the Government tries to do every December.

As the Tánaiste will be aware, last night there was a major fire in the tower attached to the former Days Hotel, Ballymun. The response from the emergency services, the fire brigade and the gardaí was swift and undoubtedly prevented a major loss of life and serious injury. The response from the staff at the hotel and in the tower in evacuating the building was, equally, truly heroic. For many years, our fire services have requested additional equipment to tackle high-rise buildings, such as extension ladders, power hoses and other vital equipment, as well as training and recruitment. What is the status of the reappraisal of fire safety in the wake of the devastating Grenfell Tower fire in London, as announced by the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, in June 2017?

Thank you, Deputy.

The Minister tasked the national directorate for fire and emergency management with co-ordinating a high-level task force to carry out the reappraisal.

Colleagues of Deputy Ellis are waiting to ask their questions.

In light of the devastating fire in Ballymun, this is now a matter of urgency.

I thank our emergency response service personnel and commend them on their heroic efforts in getting people out of the building safely last night. In tackling the blaze, they put their own lives at risk. They do this on a regular basis but sometimes it takes an event such as last night's to remind us all of the incredible work they do.

There is a topical issue this afternoon on this issue, when I will speak in detail on the outcome of the task force and the work it is doing.

I am sure the Tánaiste is well aware that the country is sleepwalking into a crisis in terms of the provision of front-line community medical care through our GPs. Some 10% of the approximately 2,400 GPs practising around the country are due to retire in the next two years, with 30% due to retire within the next seven years. In County Limerick, we have 46 GPs and almost a quarter are due to retire in the next four years. We are sleepwalking to the edge of a cliff and, if the current situation continues, many parts of the country will not have a GP to provide care in the community. It is a serious situation. The FEMPI cuts, which affect the provision of primary care centres, are a money issue but what is the Government doing to retain GPs in the country and to ramp up the numbers to replace those who are retiring with an average retirement age of approximately 68?

We are increasing the number of training places for GPs and we are seeing a gradual increase in that area. An engagement involving the Department of Health, the HSE and the Irish Medical Organisation on general practitioner contractual issues, such as FEMPI, is expected to resume next month. The Minister wants to speak directly to GPs on the issue.

Over the past three weeks, I have received numerous calls from farmers in Sligo-Leitrim, north Roscommon and south Donegal who are suffering severe hardship as they try to provide fodder for their stock. The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy Michael Creed, brought in a scheme to subsidise hay and silage but the hay went up by €8 per bale and the silage by €12 so it was no benefit to farmers at all. It is a health issue for many people and I am calling for farmers to be front-loaded by €1,000 to help them to survive and to feed their families and their stock over the next month. Farmers in the part of the country I come from have been feeding their cattle in these conditions for the past eight months. They will get the money anyway but it would make a lot of difference if they got it now.

Deputy Tony McLoughlin has a similar question.

Deputy Scanlon and I have met farmer representatives on this problem, particularly those in disadvantaged areas. It is important that we make provisions for the west of Ireland and there are huge hardships in the constituency we represent so it is vitally important to accommodate the affected farmers.

This is primarily a matter for the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine. He brought in a fodder transport scheme to respond to the very wet weather. There is enough fodder in Ireland - it is about moving it around and getting it to the farms which need it and that is why transport costs were the focus. If farmers are in extreme circumstances and there are animal welfare consequences of a lack of availability of fodder, they should contact the Department directly. They will get direct help immediately for animal welfare issues linked to fodder.

Some farmers are going hungry to feed their animals.

Does the Tánaiste agree that the Central Bank Consolidation Bill is a suitable vehicle to which to attach legislation to control the activities of purchasers of distressed loans from banks and building societies, to ensure protection for borrowers and that regulations are applied not only to original lenders but secondary lenders, many of whom are now aggressively pursuing borrowers?

We do not have a date for that Bill yet but I will try to get back to the Deputy on it.

Finally, I call Deputy James Browne.

You do not get two bites of the cherry here. Deputy McLoughlin has had his opportunity.

I wanted to ask a question.

The Deputy took his opportunity to do that.

I have been waiting for the past half hour.

I cannot create a precedent. What is the question? Is it on agriculture?

Members cannot come in on one question and then come in a second time.

This is a different question. What is the point of waiting for a half hour? If I did not have a card the Leas-Cheann Comhairle would not let me up at all.

As all Members know, if a Deputy does not have a card he cannot come in on another question so by having a card he took his opportunity. As a result, he is excluded.

In the recent snow storms, farmers, horticulturalists and, in particular, fruit growers suffered significant damage, particularly to buildings, polytunnels and plants themselves. Will the Government propose a compensation scheme to allow these growers to recover from the damages they have suffered?

The Minister, Deputy Creed, is looking at the issue but he has not come back to Government with recommendations on it yet. It is a complex issue because some people had physical damage to polytunnels and others damage to crops, and it is difficult to put together a package that does not set an inappropriate precedent for loss of crops.

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