Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I understand the issue raised by the Deputies but we are in the middle of global pandemic. There is no easy answer to this. Provision was made for people who need tests for essential purposes and those involved in essential services and so forth. Additional staff have been hired. Some 40 temporary driver testers have been hired and 36 who were approved for retention were rehired in 2020. Further recruitment is going on. Waiting times have increased significantly. According to the Department, people applying today now face a potential waiting time of 25 weeks. My sense is that this is a challenging issue and will remain so for some time because of the changing nature of the virus and the arrival of the variant. I have said for a number of weeks that the variant will have an impact on many of areas of life given the higher level of transmission and transmissibility. We must get that into our heads in terms of how we roll out services. It creates the kinds of challenges to which the Deputies have referred. These issues will not be resolved simply.

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