Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

With all due respect, these lines are being trotted out by everybody in Government, and they do not stand up to any kind of scrutiny. The Minister is jumping ahead and talking about a medium-term plan. We have a real-time, now problem in respect of the figures rising all the time. The response from the Government has been wholly inadequate in respect of testing and tracing. The Minister talked about last week. A total of 57% of what we are told is the capacity was used last week, and that was the highest percentage that has ever been used. Where is this 100%? We have heard reports about staff being redeployed from other areas where they are needed. That is not an adequate response. The Government needs to start taking this issue seriously again. The early response was fine but it took its eye off the ball. There are a whole lot of gaps in our response. Nobody knows what the strategy is now in respect of Covid. We are supposed to be testing, tracing and isolating, but that is not happening at the level required. Will the Minister give any kind of commitment that this issue is going to be taken hold of by the Government and that we are going to see action in those three areas rather than vague promises?

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