Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Táim breá sásta tacaíocht a thabhairt done Bhille seo

We welcome the necessity and reason for this Bill, including the additional powers that will be necessary for An Garda Síochána in what I imagine will be a very small number of situations. Before I speak to the Bill and the provision of additional Garda powers, I would like to commend the Garda, a number of whom I dealt with over the weekend, who were involved with the Irish Coast Guard and Dundalk Sub Aqua Club and a number of other people in a very tragic search and recovery operation. My thoughts go out to the family of the man lost. I commend the Garda in that regard. I also commend it on its apprehension of the two men involved in the dumping of 30 tonnes of commercial waste, building rubble, outside of Dundalk on the Doylesfort Road. The Garda came upon the truck involved and I understand it is pretty far on in its investigation which will hopefully have a beneficial end. Dundalk is like many towns and many rural areas throughout Louth and the State that have been hammered over the years by illegal dumping, be that on a small scale or a large scale. It would be remiss of me not commend the Garda in that regard.

As I said earlier, I do not believe these powers will be necessary in most cases. Most publicans and restaurateurs who are open are operating good businesses that they have run down through the years and they want to remain open. There is a necessity at times to deal with people who continually break the rules. I welcome that there are a number of stages in regard to the penal provisions of this legislation. That is necessary. I want to add my voice to those of other people, particularly my colleagues in Sinn Féin, who spoke of the necessity for a sunset clause. Legislation like this does not necessarily fit very well with the Irish psyche but we have all witnessed scenes, about which we need not get overly worked up, that are unacceptable. We need to ensure that the Garda, should it come upon such activity in the future in a pub-type setting, has the powers to deal with it.

Earlier, I heard the Minister, Deputy McEntee, say on the radio that this may provide part of a roadmap for the reopening of what we now term "wet pubs". I hope I have not misquoted the Minister. This sector has taken a real hit in this crisis. We need to facilitate it as much as possible, while accepting that the Government will be led by NPHET. There is a necessity to examine what can be done and how quickly it can be done.

We are dealing with an element of anger in society, some of it down to a lack of clarity from Government communications. In regard to the last set of restrictions, I have been contacted by a number of people who believe the restrictions were poorly communicated, some of them changed later again. I am speaking specifically about rules in regard to gyms. Some of these changes may have been sensible. I understand that Basketball Ireland sought and received an exemption on the holding of games inside, which makes sense. I accept that when setting out rules one will not always cover every base but in this case too many bases were not covered. There was also unfortunate commentary from some Ministers. I do not think I need to go into the fact that people were irate when they saw pretty drastic breaches of the rules and a narrative that even outside of a time of pandemic people would not be happy about in terms of certain cohorts of people, including politicians, bankers and others, continuing as normal. It was their worst notion of politics and the old boys network. We need to avoid as much of that as possible, accepting that rule breaches will happen from time to time and often times accidentally. We call on people to maintain the rules in regard to the number of people in their houses but from time to time visitors will call and householders might be in slight breach of the rules but they need to be as careful as possible. What we do not need is neighbours reporting neighbours in an almost Stasi situation. Breaches that are utterly criminal need to be reported as quickly as possible.

What we need is clarity from Government. People are calling for leadership. People are generally better than sometimes we give them credit for. If an argument is well made to them they will be willing to accept it. I was glad to hear the Taoiseach say that within the next two weeks we will have a plan in regard to how we operate into the near future. Many of us had probably set artificial timelines in regard to how long this crisis would continue. In a best case scenario we could be incredibly lucky and we could have a vaccine in six to nine months but that is rather unlikely. People are talking about the possibility us being in the current situation we are in for another two years. We need to ensure that our plan is well thought out. I accept every plan needs to be revised but we need to ensure that it takes into account those businesses and sectors, like pubs, that have hit the ground. We also have a difficulty in regard to the travel sector. I spoke to a number of travel agents, who are utterly exposed at this point in time because consumer laws that are absolutely necessary are actually putting them under incredible pressure, not particularly helped by the likes of Ryanair in respect of how it pays it money back.

We need sector-by-sector solutions in this regard. People are willing to deal with the Government. The Opposition is willing to be sound in these sets of circumstances but we need absolutely clear commentary. We are dealing with some of the weaknesses that were already in our society, whether in respect of workers' rights, schools, the drug problem and other issues with which the Garda is dealing or the lack of mental health services. These are all things that have been a problem but a plan will need to take all of them into account.

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