Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

First, I want to take the opportunity, which other members have not taken as yet, to acknowledge the scale of the challenge that the Department has faced, particularly since 2022. There has been an unprecedented influx of people, which, as Mr. McCarthy said, is probably the largest in the history of the State. I commend the action taken by the Department to accommodate 100,000 people who arrived on our shores needing shelter and help. When we look at the minutiae of it, and the job of this committee is to drill down into things, we will find errors and instances where things should have been done better but in the broad sweep of history, when we look back on this period, we will say that the State, and the Department in particular, was asked to shoulder a burden and to protect people who needed our help and it rose to that challenge, however imperfectly and in however many ways we could have done it better. That should be acknowledged.

It should also be acknowledged, although I do not expect Mr. McCarthy or any of his officials to comment, that the Department has been asked to shoulder a really significant burden that has involved an enormous expansion of expenditure by the Department. I acknowledge the issues raised by other Deputies and have the same concerns in my own constituency and community but I want to recognise the incredible work the Department has done under enormous pressure. The response may be imperfect, as I said, but a huge challenge was placed in front of the Department and for the most part, it has risen to that challenge. I thank the Department for that work.

My first question reflects what I have just said. Looking at spending, which is the most basic way of judging the size of the Department, we see that it rose from €1.8 billion in 2021 to €2.7 billion in 2022. When we take in the disability line too, we are probably looking at an increase of 300%, if not more, in spending by the Department. I want to ask about the capacity of the Department in that context. A lot of the issues that we are identifying here around community engagement and the outsourcing of inspections only relate to one line of spending, that of temporary and international protection. What are the plans to scale up the Department? The spending of the Department has increased by at least 300% but it is not at the capacity that is needed to meet its new obligations. Is the Department sanctioned to spend in terms of extra staffing and can it get the staff it needs? What are the long-term plans for increasing capacity in the Department?