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

When I spent time some years ago on Oileán Chléire, off the coast of west Cork, I saw a great summer thunderstorm sweeping in off the ocean. As it gobbled up Fastnet Rock the windows and doors across the island were pulled to and made secure and livestock huddled into what shelter they could find. Everybody prepared as best they could for the storm to make landfall. I get the same sense here today, as we await the surge. Our healthcare workers are the lighthouse keepers who are already feeling the brunt of that storm, with worse to come. Today we must offer them our gratitude and every last support the State can give them to help them weather this crisis.

Meanwhile, here on the island we must make the best preparations we can. I commend again the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection and her Department officials who have put together a sweeping range of measures. As the Minister acknowledged, they are not perfect but they are very good considering the timeframe in which they were constructed. The pandemic unemployment payment is providing some measure of comfort to people who have lost their jobs owing to the outbreak. Likewise, the temporary wage subsidy scheme is allowing businesses to retain employees in anticipation of better days ahead.

However, as is understandably the case with measures so quickly designed in reaction to an unprecedented crisis, there are gaps in provision and areas where people have fallen between the cracks. To give the Minister and her officials their due, they have in most cases reacted quickly to the shortcomings in the scheme and have given the concerns raised by Opposition spokespersons a fair hearing when we have been given the chance to have input. There remain areas of shortcoming within the scheme and cohorts whose needs still have to be met. I hope the Department will remain flexible in addressing those in need.

Like my colleague in Sinn Féin, I have had many representations from people who fall outside the range of the pandemic unemployment payment, such as apprentices under 18 years of age or older citizens who might be supplementing their pension provisions with part-time work. While I accept the principle of a working age payment and why age limits might apply, that is cold comfort to those who have been excluded, be they aged 17 or 70. I hope the Department can find a way to help these people in the weeks ahead.

Likewise, many in our communities may find it difficult to demonstrate a loss of income. They include mothers returning from periods of unpaid maternity leave or members of our arts communities who may work from project to project, commission to commission or gig to gig. There are workers on low-hour contracts who make the bulk of their income in overtime and now find themselves reduced to 70% of their minimum contracted hours under the temporary wage subsidy scheme. This represents a serious loss of income.

Others may continue to be employed but may wish to self-isolate or cocoon themselves. I have been contacted by people with underlying conditions which make them especially vulnerable to Covid-19, be that asthma, diabetes or heart conditions, or who are living with elderly or infirm relatives and are terrified of the consequences of contracting the virus. They must be supported in their decision to temporarily step out of the workforce. I welcome the extension of the Covid-19 payment to these citizens, but I note it is only payable for a two-week period. This should be extended in cases where the person in question can certify their vulnerability to the infection. I also strongly recommend that the Government provide certainty to people hoping to avail of this payment that their employers will allow them to take this leave and that their jobs will be there for them when they decide to come back.

In fact, there is a job of work to be done to protect all employees who are still at work at this time and to protect the State from spurious claims on the public purse. While the overwhelming response of people in Ireland to the outbreak of Covid-19 has been one of social solidarity, there will always be unscrupulous people who will spot an opportunity in a crisis. Like many others here, I have heard whispers about employers who have sought to introduce rationalisation measures during this period and have laid off higher-paid employees while retaining younger staff on the temporary wage subsidy scheme. I have also heard of companies which hope to leverage the 70% wage subsidy scheme to secure cheap labour while keeping their doors open for business. This is, I am sure, a tiny minority, but I urge the Minister to put in place structures that would allow employees to report any abuse of the provisions put in place during this period of uncertainty.

I must again emphasise, as I did two weeks ago in this Chamber, the needs of some of our more marginalised communities.

We are hearing reports of illness establishing a foothold in the Traveller community and in direct provision centres. We must begin to provide people in these settings the opportunity to self isolate effectively in order to stem the spread of the virus in what are often crowded settings. I would include our prison population and those in emergency accommodation in this cohort. It will be a measure of our society how well we look after our most vulnerable in this period. While we wait for the storm to come it may seem too early to begin to think about a time when the sky is clear again. Right now our citizens and front-line workers in particular are living day to day, hour to hour and coping to the best of their ability. I commend them. I am very proud of how we as a nation have risen to this challenge but there must also be a role for us as elected representatives to look beyond the surge to how we rebuild an economy and society after a sudden shock not seen in our lifetimes. Our Uachtarán has argued that the reaction to the Covid-19 crisis has made an unanswerable case for universal basic services and I agree with him. It has also shown the merits and possibilities of a universal basic income, something that the pandemic unemployment payment comes very close to modelling. In responding to this tsunami, listening to and following the best scientific evidence and the advice of experts, we have shown how we might act to combat that more slow but ultimately more devastating inundation of climate change and biodiversity collapse that poses a more deadly threat to this planet than even this pandemic.

If social protection is about the care of individuals in our society it must also be about the protection of our society as a whole. In a parliamentary democracy the work of parliament is paramount. The Dáil must sit. When my next door neighbour is asked to go to her job as a carer each day, when my former student turns up to work at a shop counter each day, can I, as a Teachta Dála really sit at home and identify myself as a non-essential worker? The Dáil must sit. I acknowledge that today's sitting carries a risk of spreading the virus, not just for the Deputies in the Chamber but the kitchen staff, the ushers and all the ancillary staff who stand behind the work of this Chamber. We are open to new ways of working but against the backdrop of extraordinary legislation passed in the last month, with parliamentary questions suspended, briefings for party spokespersons intermittent and dwindling, the need for parliamentary oversight and scrutiny has never been more acute. However it sits, however we use the new technologies available to us, the Dáil must sit. We have learnt that in times of crisis it is not the markets we turn to for help but each other. Mar a dúradh anseo cheana, ar deireadh thiar thall, is ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine.

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