Paul Donnelly (Dublin West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their presentations. I recognise some of their faces from the islands. We were there last year.

In relation to the islands piece, there was one point that struck me. Childcare was a big issue, but the housing issue struck me as particularly difficult. When we look at the area of tourism, we must ensure that in the summer there is the lifeblood of money coming in and that there is the capacity to get people in. Yet, how does that affect people who are living in on the islands? I was struck when I saw a lot of properties there that had been sold. People had been saying that they were pretty much empty once the summer season is over.

These were built by people on the islands who then sold them off to people from outside the islands who used them as a second income. How can it be ensured that if affordable housing is built on the islands, it does not fall into the hands of those from outside who will simply use it as a summer property and leave it empty for the winter? How does that help with sustainable growth? There is a big issue with that.

I was struck by a number of issues relating to the SDGs. During Covid, we really noticed digital poverty and the divide created by digital disadvantage. We were getting reports of young people, especially, when the schools were closed who were doing their homework on mobile phones, if they had access to a mobile phone or the Internet. That was a big problem. Some partnerships such as ours, Empower in Dublin 15, set up projects and got funding from the Department to try to bridge that gap. It is a significant issue where people in our communities do not have access to a laptop or, if there are three children in a home, they do not have three laptops.

We had a presentation yesterday from the Irish Heart Foundation. It raised the issues relating to access to medical cards and the cost of medication for people who were previously in well-paid jobs who were doing quite well and then suddenly they had a condition and could not work. Their income falls through the floor at the same time as they need the medication but it is slightly above the threshold – perhaps their partner is working – so they are not eligible for a medical card. That is a really significant problem. It also identifies the area of health, which also fits into the other strategic goal. I was very interested in the proposal to put warnings on highly processed foods and how complex this is because some highly processed foods are quite good for you. There is a real challenge of poverty and access to healthy foods. Most of healthy foods are more expensive than the highly processed foods such as burgers and sausages. It is a big challenge and it goes back to the first goal of how we create a more level playing field around income so that people can access these things.

On equality in education has been raised in my area, certainly, around DEIS plus. We have DEIS but there are schools in areas, which I will not name, which experience huge difficulties, disadvantage, poverty and problems around access to mental health services, SNAs and other additional needs services. These are all things that create huge problems and difficulties for schools in ensuring that every child in the school has a level playing field that they can obtain the best level of education they can.

Finally, on waste management, there is a growing move around remunicipalisation of waste management. We all know dumping, especially in Dublin and other cities, is a huge problem affecting our communities. There are three or four different waste management companies in Dublin. I was going through the city last night and it seems like rubbish is everywhere. Businesses are putting their rubbish out on the street in plastic bags, which are getting ripped apart by seagulls and birds, and the place looks really bad. That is because there is no coherent waste management strategy. The sector has been privatised and there are three or four different companies. Another issue about privatisation that has become apparent is that there is not really competition. We were told that competition in the market would reduce prices and we would have a wonderful system but that is not happening. There are many parts of Dublin, and certainly in my constituency, where only one company goes in and collects the rubbish while there are other areas where there might be three or four different companies. I will not call it a cartel but there might be an agreement between companies so that only one company goes in and the other company will not do business on a particular estate. The prices for waste collection are going off the scale. It really bugs me is that we were told we would only pay for what we throw away but that is not the truth; we are paying for everything - the green, black and brown bins – and it is an ever-increasing price. That is fine for someone in a good job who can pay but for many people it is a real struggle. People are refusing to use the brown bin and finding other inventive ways of getting rid of their recycling, which is putting pressure on recycling centres. Some of those are free and the council is now looking to charge for them. I thank Deputy Ward for some of the questions he has put.