Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As every other Deputy has done, I want to open my words by offering condolences for those who have lost their lives as we battle this virus. I also want to offer recognition of all of those who are playing such a vital role in allowing us to respond to the virus and, I am confident, with the passage of time, contain it and then defeat it. To all of those who are devoting their lives and their time, at risk to themselves, we owe our great gratitude.

As other Deputies have done, I want to acknowledge those who have worked with myself and the Government, over the past week in particular, to look at how we marshal our resources in a new way to support those who are in need at the time of greatest risk. I want to thank my officials in the Departments of Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform, and I want to acknowledge all of those in the Revenue Commissioners who have engaged in extraordinary work in recent days and those working in the National Treasury Management Agency, all of whose unsung work in recent weeks and days has laid the foundation for the Bill we bring to the House today.

I want to pick up on a point made by Deputy Eamon Ryan when he placed the response to this pandemic in a global context. It is appropriate to do that because we are dealing with something that is global in context and that knows no boundaries or borders. I believe it is imperative in our response, which is always anchored in the nation state, always anchored in the Government which the citizens see so close to them, to do this in a way that is anchored in the project of the European Union and anchored in a project of international co-operation and response.

Deputy Michael McGrath used the analogy of a wartime effort and, in so many ways, he is correct because what we are looking to do is defeat something that poses a risk to so many. However, in one area, that analogy could be used differently because war is about division, about separation, and what we are actually looking to do, as the Deputy acknowledged in his speech, is find how we can bring people together. That is why I believe it is vital that, within the EU, as acknowledged in the contribution today by the former president of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, there is a vital element of the response that is collective, a vital element to the response that is about solidarity. While I understand that concerns about moral hazard sometimes play a very prominent role in those kinds of debates, such concerns about moral hazard have to be seen in the light that we have European neighbours and friends who are experiencing a loss of life on a daily basis that is truly comparable to what sometimes happens in war. That is what we, here in Ireland, are devoting our resources to try to stave off and reduce in our own country. I know this is an issue the Taoiseach will address in the European Council and that will develop across today and in the coming days.

Deputy Shortall made a very important point in regard to the role of public services and the fact public services here in Ireland, nearly all of the time, are universal in how they are constructed. What I ask her and others to consider, when they are evaluating this Bill, is that this is precisely the concept this legislation is anchored upon. What I have always argued in many debates in the House is that, as strongly as I feel about that role, I do not see the state as a response to the failure of others or as something that has to step in when the market fails. The state is a vital, positive, constructive force. It is the animating concept in our lives as citizens and it is the vital response at a time of need. However, it is also something that exists within constraints, it is also something that creates incentives, it is also something that needs to be able to fund itself.

It is precisely because of decisions made in recent years that we are at a point where we can marshall our responses to this extraordinary challenge ahead of us. I acknowledge the work of many who have allowed us to be at this point where we can respond. At the heart of the sections of this Bill for which I am responsible as the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Public Expenditure is the concept that at the time of a loss of income the State should step in. It should look to guarantee and subsidise a portion of that income. By investing in that income, the State can keep a job, stand by citizens at a time of need and lay the foundations for a recovery that will come when the recovery in our public health allows.

Underpinning this idea is that by acting now we offer ourselves the ability, but not the guarantee, to stave off even worse challenges, that could be economic in nature, potentially, in the near future. By intervening now, we can stand by citizens at a time of great economic need and, hopefully, allow them and those who employ them to retain a contract, a relationship, an economic relationship, in the place of work at the very time in which we are aware of obligations and commitments to each other that are even deeper. All of this is being done at a time of relative consensus within this House on the need to do it.

As we acknowledge that consensus, however, we should not do so at the expense of not acknowledging what a massively significant intervention this is. The cost of this intervention to the State will be approximately €300 million per week. That cost is only based on estimates we are creating at a point of huge uncertainty. That cost could grow, depending on the challenge we face, or it could diminish if we are successful. That acknowledgement of risk and what could change, however, only deepens my view that this is the kind of action a State needs to take at a time of need. I spoke earlier about the employment contract between employers and employees. We take this action because at a time in which we talk about those contracts, we acknowledge a contract that is even deeper, that is the social contract.

At a time in which citizens experience a profound and massive loss of earnings at a speed for which we have no precedent, the State needs to play a role. We acknowledge that because, as Deputy Grealish touched on, at a time when we have small companies and the self-employed all over Ireland not knowing where their futures stands, where we have people who never thought they would be losing a job now finding themselves having to access a Covid-19 pandemic payment, we have to say to those people that even though the journey back to economic health will be long, could be fraught and could have new risks, that we will complete that journey. Completing our journey in our public health is the first step back towards rebuilding an economy.

Listening to what Deputy Harkin said in her contribution, the economy we will rebuild will be different to the economy we are now seeing changing. It will be an economy that is very different in how it is organised, potentially, to before the crisis. Equally, however, it will be an economy that, with the right decisions taken now, will be capable of providing the incomes and employment so many need.

As I approach my last few moments making a speech, as would be expected, focused on our economy, let me also state that the guiding light of our decisions is the public health of our citizens and of seeing them as citizens. In a day, and in moments, in which we reflect on other sources of nourishment, I think a poem was acknowledged this morning on our national airwaves by Derek Mahon. In that poem, he offers assurances to many that better days could be ahead.

It is an appropriate poem because during it, he acknowledges that "There will be dying, there will be dying". In our efforts, led by the Taoiseach and the Minister for Health and supported by everybody here, we are looking to diminish those deaths. Elsewhere in that poem, about the act of writing a poem, he says "the hidden source is the watchful heart." At this point, as citizens in our communities and families, let us use that watchful heart to ensure social distancing does not become loneliness. That is an act that all of us, public representatives or not, can be complicit in and can play our role in discharging.

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