Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with Deputy Mattie McGrath. We have heard here that people have been looking for the building sector to close down but we have to take a holistic view. Workers in the building sector get paid through the banking system and the banking system is holding building contractors and others to ransom because one gets paid in accordance with the work one is doing. That work has to be signed off by engineers and that sign-off goes back into the banking sector again in order for the banks to pay out on the work that has been done. Many of the building contractors who are working at the moment and who are keeping people separated at appropriate distances should be commended for the work they are doing. There are other contractors out there who are exploiting the situation and they should be dealt with by the heavy hand of the law. However, we have an awful lot of small contractors throughout this country who are building farm buildings for the farming community in order to keep food on the table for us.

There are two different sectors within the construction sector. There is a lot of building ongoing in the big cities and there is a lot building ongoing in rural areas. Building sites in rural areas can accommodate bigger separation distances whereas the big construction sites can find it hard to do so. The Government needs to implement measures that will look at the knock-on effects if it closes down the building sector. The suppliers the Government has asked to stay open in order to supply the food chain, the building contractors and the farmers are all depending on the payments they get from different sectors. The banks have to play their part again in making sure the funding comes at the time it is needed and that if one sector is closed, the suppliers the Government wants to stay open are not being pushed to provide all the other supplies such as fodder for our farming communities so that they are not forced to close as well. We have to implement measures so that all sectors can be covered and that when it comes to a point where the building sector can recommence, the suppliers will not take it out on the contractors for delayed payments due to the banking sector and the regulations that are in place.

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