Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

We are told the purpose of the Credit Guarantee (Amendment) Bill 2022 is to make amendments to the Credit Guarantee Act 2012 to support the needs of business to access additional finance. According to the Government, the creation of a Ukraine credit guarantee scheme is in response to economic difficulties resulting from the aggression by Russia against Ukraine.

My goodness what will we call it next? Will we change our name altogether? Instead of being Ireland will we become Ukraine? The last scheme did not work. The Minister will remember that. It was an abject failure because the money was not given to the small companies; it was given to the grubby main banks and they would not lend it. Farmers, agricultural contractors and businesspeople who had vibrant business plans were told "No, no, no". Yet the Government makes the same mistake over and over again. Someone told me one time that to keep doing the same thing over and over again is the definition of "mental illness". Yet we see the Government doing the same thing here the whole time. It is beholden to the banks. It is selling off part of AIB now to make more money. This is not going to work. It does not cut it with me and it does not cut it with ordinary people. The amount of money being talked about is staggering. There are three reasons that I can see. There is the ongoing dysfunctional energy policy, which places a ban on domestic energy sources, especially our own here if it is not renewable. We all want to be renewable and be green but we do not have the wherewithal to do it. We do not get into the car tonight and then take off two wheels before we go to drive it. We have to keep it going, get the NCT and keep it roadworthy and have it taxed and insured and keep the licence and all to drive it. However, here the clamour is to be greener and holier than thou. It is complete codology. I could call it worse.

The lack of an energy facility is another madness until such time as we have the renewables. Our oil prices and taxes are among the highest in the world, especially carbon tax. One of our European partners, possibly Sweden - it will not come to me - deferred carbon tax two weeks ago because of the cost-of-living crisis but, no, the Government parties want to bring it in like they are going out on a fine day making a cock of hay in the field long ago. They have a nice big cock to give out to their friends, the big business people. That is what it is at. As I said the providers for the scheme are supposed to be the primary producers and mid-caps defined as businesses with up to 490 people. What is the minimum size of a business that is allowed to approach for a loan? Who is looking after the business for the fear amháin or the bean amháin, the one-man show or one-woman show? Who is looking after them, giving them money? What about those with one to five workers who maybe have a couple members of the family working, or one to ten? They are the businesses being crushed and walked over. They cannot keep the lights on at the moment and then cannot get finance from any source. They get it from the credit union to be repaid to the credit union but anybody else, no. We are trying to support the credit unions. The Central Bank, of course, moved in at the behest of the Government and the Minister at the time, Michael Noonan, and nobbled them and any idea they had. We went abroad and looked at banking models. There is a model in New Zealand and Sparkasse in Germany is a model of community banking, of the people for the people by the people. I did research on those. I have never been to Germany but I always thought it was about massive companies like Volkswagen and Bosch and the products that we see. In Germany, 90% of the companies comprise one to 50 people and they have community banking that lends to the community and all the profits go back into the community. That would not do in Mother Ireland at all because we could not look after the people who look after the Government parties, who bankrolled them and kept them in power for years. The naked truth is as simple as that. Why else would the Government not change and look after the people? They look after the big people all the time.

We met with ESB senior officials today. I thank them for coming to meet us, and I thank the ESB staff on the ground who work in all weathers and come out at all times. We had a meeting of nearly two hours. It was an exhausting meeting. We expected something but they cannot do anything because of Government legislation and the so-called regulator who will not allow them to bring down the prices. Imagine that the regulator will not allow that, the regulator who is meant to be acting on behalf of the people, daoine na hÉireann, as the Government is, and as we are, elected for the time being to represent the people, but the Government abandoned the people a long time ago. That is why the Government will be moved out of there soon and others will take its place because it has been there for 11 years and things have gone from bad to worse from the bank so-called bailout, which was a cleanout and robbery. The Government put nothing only misery on the people and the regulator will not allow the ESB to drop the costs. They were delighted for a while that legislation was being prepared at European level that might give us some hope of a reduction but, no, that cannot happen either even though legislation is going to be proposed in a blaze of glory. Ministers will probably fly out again on jets to Europe or some part of Europe for another global summit, meet their global masters and come back to say they are introducing this Europe-wide. However, it is not going to back off the meter on the wall or off the businessman who cannot keep his butcher shop open or his restaurant open. Businesses are closing, including the one-man show, the two-man show and the firms with one to ten employees. They are the people who are disappearing like snow off a ditch. Family businesses for generations will never be replaced. We lost the bakery in Clonmel town recently after 62 years of service to the people because of the cost of electricity. The Government did nothing for them. Its failure to act is a betrayal of the people. It brings in Bills like this but it might as well use the paper to make a paper trail for the kids to play with in the front year because that is as far as it is going to get. The Government will come back later on tonight to push through all Stages of this. Irish Water is another big monopoly. The Government parties are like children of five years of age let out of school. They want everything big, like big sand castles. It wants all these big utility companies. The county councils and the ordinary people, na daoine beaga, served this country well. They fought and freed it. They gave us our democracy. They brought us to where we are up till 20 or 30 years ago until the Government went greedy, mad and plundered our country. I have said it before and I will say it again: Cromwell did not do as much damage to this country as the past three or four Governments have done. I was part of the first one in 2007 and I was lucky to be released from the chains of that group but they have gone their merry way serving the global leaders of the world and not serving the ordinary daoine of Éireann.

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