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

The Deputy said I championed it. I noted what he said carefully. Deputy Calleary spoke about one of the key aspects of one of the reform measures we pushed, which is the Parliamentary Budget Office. That was a Fianna Fáil proposal in the previous election that we followed through on. Some of the key reforms in the programme for Government include expanding the role of the Parliamentary Budget Office to independently audit the cost of individual tax and spending measures contained in political parties' budget submissions and general election manifestos and to assess their overall dynamic impact and broader economic impact. It also includes continuing to ensure that Oireachtas committee chairs are allocated according to the d'Hondt system. The latter was an important reform when it was introduced. It also includes introducing a new system to register Oireachtas attendance and protect the integrity of the expenses system. We will work on all of those areas.

The Deputy raised a broader issue of the guillotining of Bills, etc. On climate change, for example, a lot of views were taken on board through the Oireachtas committee's pre-legislative scrutiny phase and subsequently. It is a Bill that has gone through change as it has gone through the House, and yet it is groundbreaking legislation. This has been an active session from a legislative point of view and a balance has to be struck between having due time for debate on legislation and also getting legislation through. We have a major housing crisis and there has been much activity on the part of the Minister in respect of a range of legislative housing initiatives that we need to get through. We need to place the Land Development Agency on a statutory footing in order to get on with the business of building houses and getting houses built. We need to get the affordability Bill through - I am glad it has been passed by this House - in order to enable people to buy houses they can afford. We can have paralysis by analysis or agility and some degree of speed and efficiency and thereby get things done.

More broadly on some of the issues that have been raised, I would say to the Opposition and to those on the far left in particular, that at the beginning of this session there was a demand almost every week for a debate on something. I am not stating that those issues were not important but the balance between a legislative Chamber and a debating Chamber sometimes gets lost. Deputies seem to be more interested in statements and debates than giving more time to legislation. Then they complain afterwards that there is not enough time for legislation. The week is short. I have consistently stated, in opposition and in government, that the Government time devoted and allocated for legislation is, with the best will in the world, tight enough. Many Members use the House as a platform. They have an entitlement to do so because they have been elected. Let us not pretend that the management or utilisation of our time or how individual Deputies or different parties will use their time in the Dáil is all one-sided. There are many sides to that argument. Different parties will have different perspectives and emphases in that regard. That needs to be said.

On hospitality, the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer, OGCIO, is the key office for certificate generation in the context of the digital Covid-19 certificates for vaccination and recovery. They are being produced by the OGCIO using data provided by the HSE. That is it. Vaccination certificates are being pushed out and that approach is enabling us to get certificates to as many people as possible as quickly as possible. For example, for certificates based on vaccination, you can get the certificate if you have been vaccinated against Covid-19 if the HSE has a valid email address for you from the vaccination process. You will get your digital Covid certificate by email. Otherwise, you will get your certificate by post. The digital Covid certificate will be in portable document format, PDF, and when that is emailed to you-----

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