Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

No. We do not organise concerts, events, or things like that. That is not our remit.

Regarding how the needs of individual Departments are determined, as I said in reply to Deputy Conway-Walsh before Deputy came in, each individual Accounting Officer is responsible for the maintenance or apportioning of space within his or her own building. Typically, most Departments and State agencies are, at minimum, doing a three-day hybrid-working-type model at the moment. The Deputy is correct to a degree, and Deputy English raised this as well, that they are not the easiest group of people to move out if change is needed. We all know that as public representatives. People in Departments are like everybody else. When they are in, they are in and they do not like moving. Sometimes they have to be moved though if, going back to Deputy Conway-Walsh's point, a lease expires. Over the past number of years, we have reflected on this, and it has been raised by many occasions by Deputies of all parties in the House, that the most preferential route is where the State owns the buildings. Ideally, the State builds them and if not, it purchases them. Where leases expire, if there is no need for them, they can be extinguished or at least have the State can have opportunity to purchase the building. We have reflected on that. I should have said in my initial comments that an opportunity has arisen at the end of 2023 and that is why I am here seeking agreement on a Supplementary Estimate for the State to acquire additional office accommodation. I cannot give the details of it now because of the commercial sensitivity but I have no problem in providing them as soon as we can after that. It is a mixture. As I have often mentioned to the Deputy and Deputy Connolly in the Dáil, it is not a one-size-fits-all response for office accommodation. Sometimes it is in the State's interest to take a lease. For instance, for an inquiry or a tribunal, if we do not have a permanent need for property in a location, it makes sense to take either short- or medium-term leases.

By the same token, it makes sense for us to hold rather than dispose of land because of, for example, potential decentralisation projects. In a previous role, Deputy English was involved in the development of the concept of modern methods of construction. The OPW has used sites that might have been regarded by a very crude instrument as surplus to requirements to kick-start the modern methods of construction, also known as modular housing, response in Claremorris, Cavan and Thurles. If we did not have those sites, we would have been starting from a detrimental point. Thanks to us having them, though, we have been able to start those projects much earlier.

Deputy English also mentioned the storms. I am glad that someone at this meeting acknowledged that the last person to die in a major weather event was an outdoor worker for Wexford County Council who was cutting a tree on the road he lived on himself. The Deputy is right, in that OPW officials, councils and volunteers with the Coast Guard and so on are the first ones to go out once the red warning is lifted. They go out into awful conditions. Without them, the situation would be much worse.

We can revert to the Deputy on the planning Bill. Internal discussions on it are under way.

For members’ benefit, Meath’s CFRAMS is all but completed. Some €27.2 million has been spent on protecting 709 properties. The last of the schemes, which is small, is in Mornington. The Ashbourne scheme has just been completed.