Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

First, I support this motion. While Covid-19 has brought many problems for people, it seems to be a cover for many things at present in taking services away. We see things changing in agriculture day in, day out. Some changes are for the better and I will never be against prosperity or moving things on. However, we also have to remember in this country that there is a generation of people who gave to this country but never had the opportunities that every one of us have had, such as being able to work a computer, being able to go online and being able to bank online or fill out forms. We seem to have become a generation that wants to nearly cast those people aside. I think a nation is viewed by how it looks after its elders. We seem to have this thing in our head of basically leaving them with difficulty, to say the least, in trying to access services. As Deputy McNamara pointed out, one could spend 90 minutes on a phone call. Does an 85-year-old deserve that? Even for Deputies, who to be frank should have a direct line such as we have in some services, in fairness it is pretty good but it takes 45 or 50 minutes to get through. Then someone will come on and say about 40 times that you can do it online. In the first instance, you might not have the broadband for it. That is the biggest problem for many people in rural areas.

Sometimes we think we are doing good. The councils were looking after licences at one time and then we decided to set up a new system. If we are going to protect or help the post office network in this country, I have always said that doing many little things will make it sustainable and make it work. However, we decided, of course, that, because of EU rules and procurement, a foreign company would get the tender. Sometimes we do things and we think are going forward, but in actual fact we are going backwards.

I ask the Minister of State to listen to the Deputy. I hope that she will not table an amendment and call a division on it. This needs to be revisited. This needs to be made accommodating for people, especially those in the rural areas, those who do not have the broadband and those who will not be hanging on the end of a phone for 90 minutes. This is a solution that needs to be put in place. However, a better solution down the road would be the likes of the post office network doing this, where there is one 5 km or 10 km away from people and where someone might talk to them, because not having that in-person interaction is the worst part in much of this. A person's problem could be worked out if someone actually talked to him or her and if he or she saw someone, not a screen.

Also, it appears as though this card, which started off in social protection, is being pushed despite the legal question. I urge the Minister of State to produce the document that was given to the Government on the legal standing of this card because sooner or later, if the Government does not make the move, someone in this country will push the button and go to the courts. If legal advice to a Government is to not use this card other than in respect of social protection, then it should be adhered to, at the very least. I envisage that if the Government keeps trying to drive this the way it is at present, someone in this country will be obligated to basically prove that it cannot do what it is trying to do.

On the whole licence issue, I have talked to people who, thankfully, have come back from Australia and different countries from where you do not have problems getting a driving licence here. As Deputy McNamara pointed out, a person has to go around the rigamarole for I do not know how long trying to get licences sorted. We should nearly have a one-stop shop and it would be a good idea for the likes of the post offices. Imagine that there are now companies setting up in Ireland that try to get people coming back to this country set up here. The person who is coming back to work in Ireland is actually paying people basically to get his or her life in line for licences, a bank account – another thing for which you now could be waiting for three months – and all the simple things that are necessary to make sure that you can live a normal life and fit into a community. We are crying out for people at the moment in different sectors, yet we are putting every block we can in their way.

Another thing on licences is that in 1992, much of the paperwork was basically eliminated. Then, a few years later, we decided to bring in a requirement whereby a person needs a trailer licence. At that time, there was no paperwork to show what one had. This trailer licence has caused huge problems, especially in the farming community, and a resolution should have been brought to the issue.

There is another thing I urge the Minister of State to do. Day in, day out I meet, elderly people in particular who got their provisional licence years ago. They never bought a car and had a tractor and were tipping around with the tractor on the rural roads. We have gone to being a society now where we look at someone and say, "That is illegal." These people at one time were used to going into the back of a van but as time progressed, we got offices in which to do the theory test. We have pushed a certain amount and we all see it as public representatives, day in and day out. Some elderly farmer that might have had a provisional licence years ago does not have a licence now and is caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Many of them never had the privilege of getting secondary education or college education, through no fault of their own. They have lived the best education of all, which is a thing called life. However, they are being pushed out and left, and they cannot even feed a few cattle with their own bale because they have no licence. I have urged for change before, and I am just blue in the face from talking about it. We talk about road safety and all the great things we are doing. As I have said, why do we not get a place such as Mondello Park? Why do we not get a place in the west of Ireland or four places in Ireland? There will not be an enormous number of them. Rather than putting people with a difficulty through this paperwork, they could go around some place that has all the signs up and do it in a simple way.

If it is done in a simple way then people who might have learning or other difficulties can be brought inside the law. We have to stop pushing people outside the law. We have to show a bit of heart and find ways to solve things.

The way things have gone in this country now, you look at a screen, answer 35 out of 40 questions or else they are a failure. That is it. Everything now is about referring to a computer or to this, that and the other. If we keep going down that road, we will push more and more people out. I see it, day in and day out. Through no fault of their own, there is a lot of these people around the country but the people who are supposed to be promoting road safety do not appear to want to listen. They are not interested in putting a simple thing in place in areas that are safe. I have suggested Mondello Park as one example but there are three or four places around the country where this could be done, rather than telling people to go into an office and press a button on 40 questions which some of them might have difficulty in reading. They are told that they can get a reader but it is just not as simple as that. These people would be the finest in the world at driving. They are driving all their lives but now they are outside the system.

I urge the Minister of State to accept the motion. I also ask her to make a statement on the card and confirm that it is going to be scrapped for once and for all.

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