Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

An tseachtain seo caite, d’ardaigh mé cé chomh seafóideach is a bhí sé plé a dhéanamh ar an gcoiste aisghabhála agus athléimneachta an tseachtain ina dhiaidh gur cuireadh isteach aighneacht an Rialtais don choiste seo. Nuair atáimid ag breathnú ar an bhfigiúir seo, is figiúir uafásach mhór atá i gceist leis an gcoiste le maoiniú de bheagnach €1 billiún d’infreastruchtúr, do dhaoine agus d’aisghabháil na tíre seo tar éis ceann de na hamanna is deacra le Covid-19. Cuirim fáilte roimh an phlé seo inniu ach ba chóir go ndearnadh plé agus mionscrúdú ar na tograí agus ar an aighneacht a chuir an Rialtas chun cinn an tseachtain seo caite. Ach ar ndóigh, táimid ag caint faoi tar éis dó a tharla. Ba í Éire ar cheann de na tíortha leis an bhforbhreathnú is lú i gcomparáid le tíortha eile san Aontas Eorpach.

Agus muid ag labhairt ar an tsuim airgid atá i gceist leis seo, mar gheall ar na fadhbanna atá againn leis an GDP, tá an tsuim airgid a bhfuair muid i bhfad níos lú ná an t-airgead a bhfuair na tíortha eile. Tá muidne i Sinn Féin ag ardú na fadhbanna a bhaineann leis an mbealach ina mbreathnaítear ar an GDP le fada. I dtaobh na mbeart atá luaite san aighneacht, tá go leor acu ardaithe cheana féin. Níl an t-uafás nua ann. Tá an-díomá orm nár pléadh an aighneacht seo sular cuireadh isteach é. Tá sé fíorthábhachtach go mbeadh plé agus díospóireacht ar aon rud chomh tábhachtach leis seo atá le cur isteach go dtí an tAontas Eorpach agus go mbeadh tuairimí chuile dhuine ina leith pléite agus curtha in iúl.

Last week, during a debate on the Order of Business, I voiced my concerns that we would be debating the recovery and resilience plan after the Government had already made its submission. As the Minister will be aware, at the time Sinn Féin requested that the debate be held beforehand. I tried to get it on the Order of Business last week because I really believe that a debate on this matter should have taken place. While I welcome this debate, it is taking place after the fact and after the horse has bolted. The reality is that, prior to today, there has not been substantial engagement with the Oireachtas or Oireachtas committees on the plan. As such, there has been limited Oireachtas scrutiny in the preparation of the recovery and resilience plan. That is really unfortunate. It would have been nothing but positive to include people and to allow them to speak and have a discussion on this submission rather than waiting, keeping it secret and then bringing it before the House after the fact. It was a missed opportunity on the part of the Government.

There was public consultation on the matter but it should have been spoken about in this Chamber. The Joint Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach, on which I sit, sought further information and engagement on it but, again, that did not happen. This State has had some of the lowest levels of parliamentary engagement and democratic oversight with regard to these submissions among EU member states. In my short time here in Leinster House, I have been struck by how little engagement there is with the Opposition in respect of matters like this, particularly when they cost money. We often see money messages being refused for Opposition Private Members' Bills and the like. We even see this issue in the Opposition's limited role in the budgetary cycle. When it comes to matters such as this, we have even less input. Given the scale of the funds involved and the conditions the Commission has reportedly attached to those funds, it was poor practice and a missed opportunity not to hold this debate earlier.

The draft plan is now undergoing formal assessment by the European Commission before being submitted to the Council of the European Union. We have heard that Ireland is to receive an allocation of €915 million from the EU as part of its €750 billion pandemic recovery fund. We have heard that the Government's plans outline 16 investments and nine areas for reform. Our allocated portion of the recovery fund is, of course, small compared to those of other EU jurisdictions. As we have said many times, our overly inflated GDP means that we look like we are in better shape than we, and the ordinary people of the State, are actually in. As a consequence, we often receive less than we deserve. For instance, Finland will receive almost three times what we are getting. Of course, Ireland is a net contributor to the EU budget. During the period from 2021 to 2027, we will be paying approximately €25 billion to the EU's budget. In this context, our allocation of less than €1 billion seems small.

Moving on from that issue, as I believe I have made my point quite clearly, I will speak on the plan itself. I will first mention the positives. Some of the things that we ourselves had suggested in this regard have been included, including an electronic system for sharing medical records, something for which we have been calling for a long time and which has long been needed. Another is the proposal for regional work hubs, which are absolutely needed. In light of how people have changed their views on where to live and work, this is important. There are also proposals to retrofit State buildings and to invest in public transport. These are all measures we had recommended so I welcome their inclusion by the Government.

With regard to some of the other measures outlined, however, it seems to be a case of reheating last night's dinner and trying to present it as a freshly cooked meal. Some of the infrastructural proposals have already been announced in the national development plan. The river basin management plan was announced three years ago. The rehabilitation of peatlands was also announced previously. It is said that, to protect the environment, we should all try to reduce, reuse and recycle but I was not aware that this also applied to Government policies.

One of the big flagship projects which is news is the retrofitting plan but it has not been well thought through. Obviously, what we want is to improve the energy efficiency of homes. People want that for their own homes. Many of my friends and colleagues are in that situation. The reality, however, is that the costs proved to be prohibitive. The average cost of retrofitting a house is approximately €50,000 and it can be up to €80,000. We again heard discussion of this on "Morning Ireland" this morning. What we are talking about here are loans. We know that the State can borrow at negative rates and that we are to receive this sum of nearly €1 billion, but the Government is expecting people to pay interest of 3.5% on a loan for a procedure which is absolutely unaffordable for many. If the Government wants significant uptake of retrofitting, we need to look at the cost. The plan does not do that. The State is the largest consumer in the economy and, through economies of scale, it could work to bring down the price. The Government, of course, knows this.

This applies not only to retrofitting but to the construction of housing. In our submission in respect of the recovery and resilience fund, we made the case that additional money, which we called capital catch-up, should be allocated to help to put the construction of housing back on track. We are badly behind targets due to the restrictions. We have heard that the Minister has concerns with regard to capital spending targets which may not be reached. This was reported in the media. Yesterday, the Government announced its economic recovery plan of which the recovery and resilience fund forms part. This document says that the Government has a target of 33,000 homes per annum. My major concern is that this target will not be reached. Of course, the issue of our housing deficit has been identified by the EU as one of the reform areas we need to address but hidden on the last page of the submission, in the annex, social and affordable housing is listed as an area on which we need to work. I can tell the Minister that this is not news to many people. Last month, we even saw the International Monetary Fund point out that we have a deficit in respect of housing so, for the life of me, I cannot understand why this has not been given priority status with regard to the fund. I am sure that when the EU told us that we needed to address this crisis in housing, it would have been assumed that some of this €1 billion in funding would have been used to invest in housing. It seems, however, that once again the Government is just not taking the housing situation seriously.

To sum up, there are some proposals in the Government's plan that are new and some that are useful. Unfortunately, it seems that the useful ones are not new and the new ones are not useful.

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