Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this matter as it is very close to my heart and close to the hearts of many people in my constituency. I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward the Private Members' motion so that we can discuss it today.

I acknowledge and commend a group called Grow Remote, a community-led enterprise that was working in this field long before Covid came into being. Grow Remote provides access to employers and employees to match up to work remotely, whereby firms and companies want people to work remotely and people who want to work remotely can be matched up. This has been, and continues to be, a phenomenal success, and has been done in a very simple way.

I also wish to commend the Department of Rural and Community Development on their efforts, along with the Western Development Commission and the Atlantic Economic Corridor task force, in setting up many digital hubs along the Atlantic economic corridor. Even in my constituency of Galway East a number of hubs are in place where people can go to work when they do not have broadband connection to their homes.It is important that if people are working remotely they have access to broadband. The national broadband plan will do that in time but the digital hubs are a very good interim measure to ensure people have access to the Internet so they can conduct their business. If people are working in different parts of the country, they have access to these digital hubs to call in to do their business online, and then they can go on to wherever they want again. The fact that there is a platform set-up that gives access, sets out where these places are, and who to contact, is a great tool.

I also commend the Western Development Commission and the Whitaker Institute of Innovation and Societal Change in National University of Ireland Galway, which produced a report, Remote Working: Opportunities, Challenges and Policy Implications. This is a very timely report and it issues a number of recommendations, some of which I will address shortly. The report's executive summary considers the issues that Government must deal with, as well as those that organisations and employers must deal with. On remote working, the report states:

Wider financial supports are needed to provide appropriate equipment for those who are obliged to work from home ... An awareness raising campaign is needed to promote health and safety guidance and user-friendly templates for supporting those who are working from home.

Government should consider extending the right to request flexible working to all workers and not just those with caring duties. In the context of the Government’s Remote Work strategy, the right to request remote work should be explored. [I believe it should not alone be explored; it should be there as a right]

As part of a national strategy for remote working a review of current tax reliefs around e-Working and expenses should be undertaken, to ensure that tax reliefs defray the costs involved in remote working. A review of the e-Working allowance rate should be undertaken, considering both costs and savings for both employers and employees realised through the practice of remote working.

The take-up of available tax allowances to enable employees to remote work should be promoted especially in the context of the wider social and economic benefits [that accrue].

In a constituency such as Galway East when listening to the AA Roadwatch radio bulletins on "Morning Ireland", or on "Drivetime" in the evening, there is constant mention of the traffic jams in Claregalway, Bóthar na dTreabh, and so on, all trying to get around Galway city. If some of these commuters were to work from home, even in a blended way of perhaps two or three days per week, the volume of carbon emissions saved would be a huge benefit. We talk about bringing electric cars and doing all of these different things to try to reduce our carbon emissions, and we have an opportunity here staring us in the face. We need to make sure that we afford the opportunity to anybody who can work remotely, and for whom it suits, as well as suiting their type of work.

In fairness, there are issues relating remote working and working from home that have to be addressed. People who enter the workforce initially need to have peer training, and they need to work with their colleagues to gain the necessary experience for them to develop their careers. One cannot have trainees working remotely. That is an issue.

From the employers' point of view, this is a win-win situation. The amount spent on providing facilities such as real estate, maintenance of huge office spaces, running costs, insurance costs and all that goes with this can be reduced to a degree that will afford more profit for these employers and will reduce the overall cost of emissions. We must consider this for the public service so that people can work from home, and should work from home as much as they can, to allow us to not spend so much money in providing offices and spaces, which following the pandemic are required to be much bigger than before the pandemic. There is a lot of things that can happen here.

Digital hubs are a key factor right now and they need to continue to be expanded. By expanding those digital hubs we are creating remote working in localities that are very important for regional development. I always cite the example of one particular hub that was set up almost ten years ago in Headford, County Galway. The cost of setting it up was €4,000. It was done in Moyne Villa soccer club. Today there are ten desks in that place with three people working there permanently for perhaps three or four days per week. They bring their children to school and bring them home in the evening and in between they can do their work without having to travel to Galway, or in some cases Dublin, on a daily basis and be away from their families. It is a very good example of what can be done with small money. We need the Government to make sure that these hubs are set up in small towns and the villages to allow people to work locally, raise their families locally, and provide economic advantages.

I believe that we have an opportunity to change the way we work. We need to have blended working as opposed to full-time remote working. It does not work for everybody and it does not work for every organisation. It is important that we put legislation in place that is effective and gives people the opportunity, both employers and employees, to make sure they can work remotely and still enjoy the same opportunities for promotion and development of their careers, and not just be based in offices all of their lives. The fundamental thing about remote working is that it offers us potential for people, for families and for rural Ireland.

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