Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate but it is somewhat disappointing that it is necessary. We had an opportunity to discuss these issues two weeks ago. It is not that we need a debate every time there is another storm. The principles remain the same. There is a storm blowing across Munster and heading towards Dublin today, but we do not need to have a debate in the House to discuss whether it is a code orange or code red event. Very significant damage is being caused throughout County Clare, with which I am most familiar, and particularly Ennis where roofs and shop-fronts are being blown off as we speak. These are really difficult circumstances. What we need to address here, however, is a co-ordinated approach to responding to such a crisis.

This has been ongoing since around Christmas in the constituency I represent in County Clare. Ministers have visited the area and, in fairness, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine visited recently in respect of the aspects relating to his Department such as ports. He also met with farmers. The Minister of State with responsibility for the Office of Public Works was there as well and assured Clare County Council that it would be given funds to deal with the crisis and told it to go ahead and spend the money. Clare County Council has proceeded, done an excellent job with the limited resources it has and carried out an extensive clean up. Sadly, much of that clean-up work was for naught because a fortnight later, another significant storm took place and pretty much the same havoc was wreaked on many of the coastal villages and tourist locations. The fact is that as of now, Clare County Council is still not clear about how much money it will get to repair the significant damage, be it to roads, piers or a range of other areas such as flood defence systems that were already there. The council is not in a position to know what it can spend the money on.

A situation has arisen in Kilbaha, which the Minister of State with responsibility for the Office of Public Works has visited. He knows full well that the road was washed away in the second storm. On Monday, the locals took it into their own hands to re-open the road. Council engineers came along and closed it again because they did not feel it was safe. In doing so, they explained to the locals that it would be June before the road would be opened. That is forcing locals to do an exceptional detour of about ten or 12 miles to collect kids from school. Even the road that is acting as the relief road is not strong enough to take milk trucks or feed trucks through to the farmers behind Keating's Bar & Restaurant and towards the lighthouse. It is not acceptable for a group of families to be told that it will be next June before the road is opened. The only reason Clare County Council is doing that is because it does not know what funds it will get. The Minister of State told it to spend the wages that it would have in place for next June, April or May and that the Government would put it back in funds. However, Deputy McNamara let the cat out of the bag when he said that Clare County Council needed €35 million to deal with this. It will not be getting €35 million. It will get some amount of money and it will be up to it to prioritise it. We have had this kind of soft approach where the council is told to spend the money and get the work done. Clare County Council was probably right not to proceed with some of this work because, quite frankly, the Department was not fessing up, not manning up and not saying what moneys it had put in place.

I appeal to the Minister to be upfront with the councils through whatever central co-ordination committee he is part of or in charge of. He should give councils the money they need. It is fine to tell them to repair or restore existing flood defences but the storms and their impact on the coastline have necessitated new requirements relating to flood defences that were not required heretofore because the topography of the land was such that the water did not inundate farmland. However, the formation of the shoreline has changed to such a significant extent that even without the normal inundation of a storm, low tides will breach the coastline and flood land.

The Minister need only visit the area to see what the impact will be. Rocks and water will be brushed onto the land.

I also appeal to the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy Coveney, to develop a workaround for farmers whose land is required for the single farm payment or the agri-environment options scheme, AEOS. He knows his Department's methodology for checking whether land is arable, for example, if certain vegetation grows there or certain pools of water make it unusable. Where land has become unusable as a result of the storm, the Minister should allow farmers to continue drawing the same level of single farm payment. In the case of the AEOS, farmers should not be penalised because of an act of God. It is not their fault. They have lost that land, in that they will not be able to graze it because it has been inundated by water and, in some cases, rocks. In other cases, it has actually been washed away. I appeal to the Minister not to penalise those farmers further. He should find a method to give them a break.

The Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Hogan, indicated that his Department did not intend to proceed with an application to the European fund. I met Commissioner Johannes Hahn. In 2009, I also met the then Commissioner. Although the threshold is high, Commissioner Hahn explained to our delegation, which was organised by Mr. Pat The Cope Gallagher, MEP, that an application made on a regional basis might not be subject to the same threshold. He was careful in his language and stated that he would work with various Departments.

I remember a similar situation in 2009 when the then Minister for Finance, the late Brian Lenihan, hesitated because the advice from Government officials at the time was that we would not be successful. In the latter hours, an application was submitted and we received €13 million. That amount would be helpful in the current climate, as the Minister well knows. We would like more, of course.

The Minister referred to having €70 million available, but the difficulty is that Clare needs €35 million. Based on the loaves and fishes work that the Minister would need to do, it is highly unlikely we will get that amount. This is the impression I am getting. The Minister is pushing it onto the shoulders of county councillors and engineers to perform a loaves and fishes miracle. He will have irate communities along the western seaboard.

There are 40 sites. Many of them are essential through routes for people going about their daily lives. Some are essential parts of the local economy, which is dependent on tourism. However, the Minister is suggesting that the communities will not get the €35 million and must find it from their own resources or leave the situation to continue. That is not acceptable. We should not have another debate the next time there is a shower of rain in some part of the country.

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