Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I sympathise with all the families and people who have lost loved ones in these precarious and very difficult circumstances. I am, however, growing very frustrated. I am privileged to be the leader of our group to attend regular two-hour briefings with the HSE.

They are an absolute waste and an insult to the intelligence of the Deputies sitting there and the officials. We had one yesterday evening which was a joke with no answers whatsoever.

I compliment the new Kildare Deputy for his insight into what is happening with the Army. I also want to raise the issue of our 300 peacekeepers who are the most noble of all and the duty that they carry out. The Taoiseach waited 17 days to reply to a letter to apply for some leniency from the United Nations directive. It is simply appalling and quite disgusting. They have families; there are 300 families involved there. There are young children some of them who were to make their first communion. Some of them were anxiously waiting to see their dads and mums come back again to live together, work together and be homemaking together. They have given their six-month stint and this creates uncertainty. To add to the disbelief, we do not have any carrier to bring them home. It is shocking. We always praise them like we are praising the nurses now instead of paying them and respecting them. We too are seeking proper pay and conditions for our soldiers and members of our Army and Navy. The Taoiseach is the boss and is in charge of this. Can he get answers for me and Deputy Berry as to why it took 17 days to reply?

The mandarins in the Departments are calling the shots. I challenge the Taoiseach directly on that. The Taoiseach's statement last night about the crèches and schools appeared to be an affront to Dr. Holohan. I compliment and support him so far, but he is not the Taoiseach. We have to look at him every night on the Nine O'Clock News and the propaganda and spin. I challenge RTÉ and the media for not asking questions about what is going on.

Others welcome the fact that we are returning to parliamentary democracy slowly but surely. However, parliamentary democracy as we had it, before ever we had this election or before we ever had Covid, was unaccountable. We see the saga of what is going on with the children's hospital. We see it now with our nursing homes. A deliberate plan, I put it to the Taoiseach, was designed to forget about the nursing homes. Deputy Nolan referred to the statement by Dr. Holohan and how he can be so sure that visitors did not bring it in. Who brought in the infection? It was not the help they were getting from the HSE. What the Government offered after several weeks was to send in HIQA. My God, what a response to a group of dedicated people who were pleading for help and begging all of us in our respective constituencies to help them. The HSE, in fact, directed the suppliers of oxygen not to supply to a nursing home; they countermanded that it should be supplied to hospitals. That should be happening in a war situation and let the nursing homes go to hell or to Connacht. These people do not matter. We saw what the Government's value of life was when it introduced abortion with a desperately liberal regime. The Taoiseach can roll his eyes to heaven if he likes. The value of life diminished among members of the Government.

There are many questions to be asked about other countries and how we have dealt with Covid. There are a lot of questions here. I am beginning to question if it is a great con. Many people die every year of influenza. Is there something else more subtle and more serious underneath this whole crisis and pandemic? Big business has too much power. This Government, the last Government and the big parties are mixed up completely with them, and have not and will not challenge them in any area.

In the meat industry, independent farmers are now trying to get live exports of cattle. We got one out. It did not suit the moguls in the beef industry. Now the Department is blocking 1,200 cattle leaving this country when it is so badly needed to keep our farmers literally alive and off the breadline. It is being blocked with red tape again because big business has the Government in its pockets and is keeping it firmly in its pockets.

Covid is now being used and abused. We have this lovely hospital, St. Brigid's in Carrick-on-Suir, now closed. The Government commandeered it and took it over. It is now removing furniture from it. I might add that the people of the town of Carrick-on-Suir funded the hospice beds and everything else there.

There are numerous questions to be asked. The gloss and sheen have gone off the spin. People are asking serious questions. Certain very well-educated professors and scientists are challenging this issue. Other countries got banished. They are being banished from the media here too. I am challenging for honesty, openness, integrity and the truth.

Why is the Taoiseach making one statement and Dr. Holohan making a different one a couple of hours later? It is a pure affront to democracy as far as I am concerned. I recognise his stewardship, but I also have questions that he needs to be asked. I turn up at briefings with my colleagues to ask numerous questions and I get no answers. I have been told when a woman waits six weeks in the town of Cahir in Tipperary for a test that it is a once-off. Deputy Pringle had another one where 21 days was a once-off.

The testing is a fiasco. The centres that so much money has been spent on are not working. No tests. A testing laboratory in County Kildare did not receive a test from midday on Friday of the bank holiday weekend until the following Tuesday. The mandarins decided that it was business as usual on the bank holiday weekend and one would think that we are out of the crisis. We need answers and accountability but we are not getting them. Above all, the Taoiseach, above all, must provide them, as must his caretaker Government. He is cobbling together a new Government to try to get back into power. There are too many questions that need to be answered. This situation is too serious and lives are being lost.

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