Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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As Deputy Farrell stated, the provision of trained workers is crucial to rolling out the retrofitting campaign. The sector is aware of the challenge. We are getting ourselves to a place to provide the training that will be required to produce the workers. As the Deputy rightly said, a training course can range from a number of days to a few weeks. There is a limited number of training centres at the moment. There are two centres of excellence and, currently, two education and training boards provide training. All the other ETBs are working now to scale up to a point where they can provide this training. As the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, alluded to yesterday when he spoke about the announcement, the sector now has certainty as the scheme has been launched. That is a good thing. In response to that, tomorrow we will invite submissions from providers, SOLAS and the ETBs. We are providing €430 million in capital to training providers to make a submission to us on their requirements to provide training centres and facilities.