Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak. I thank Sinn Féin for tabling the motion. Last week, during questions on policy and promised legislation, I raised this issue with the Taoiseach and the Minister, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, responded. I acknowledge that significant investment is being made in the fire service in terms of infrastructure, new fire stations, fire tenders and all goes with that. In my constituency, a new fire station has opened in Tuam and it is a state-of-the-art facility. A contract for the construction of a new fire station in Athenry will be signed shortly and we are about to go through a Part 8 process for a new fire station in Loughrea. These are three centres in the Galway East constituency, which badly needs these fire stations in order that we have proper facilities in which firefighters can serve the people in they way they should. It is a credit that investment is being made because we know how important the service is. All three stations have retained firefighters.

Despite this infrastructural investment, we have a concern. Speaking to the retained firemen who were outside the gates today, the biggest issue is the need to bring their infrastructure into the 21st century. They need now to viewed as people who are delivering a vital service in our society. They have expressed a view that they are being frustrated in attempts to talk about the core issue, namely, remuneration and recognition for the work they perform on a daily basis. A young person will not be attracted into fire service because the remuneration is not good enough. Retained firefighters receive a baseline retainment fee and a fixed amount per call-out. That type of payment does not augur well when they go to a mortgage broker to try to get a mortgage.

I know many people who go into the fire service. They have part-time or full-time jobs. Traditionally, local shopkeepers and publicans joined the service but that is no longer the case in the modern world. We have to make the service fit for purpose for those who deliver it, use a bit of common sense and show respect to these people.

We could get much more from the fire service if we put in the effort. Firefighters do a lot a hell of a lot more than fight fires. They could get train in other aspects of healthcare for when they are needed in an emergency. The retained fire service proved its worth beyond a shadow of a doubt in what it did in Creeslough and throughout the Covid pandemic.

Very quietly, they were there to provide back-up. They were a source of inspiration to many of us when we did not know what to do.

There is a countermotion from the Government, which I think is wrong. We should all be as one on this matter. This is not something out of which we should be making a political point. The people who were outside the gates today did not want to be here. They were not sure what to do or say but when one got talking to them as individuals, one realised they were there because they believe they are being ignored. The only way we can disprove that is for a proper and fast engagement to talk about the issues that are affecting them. The number of people entering the service has been low. Some 60% of the existing retained firefighters have said they are going to leave the service. Are we going to wait until they are gone before we put our hands into the air and ask why we did not do something about it? We have an opportunity to do a lot. Rather than just sitting down and talking to those firefighters, we must deal with the nub of the problem. We must invest in the people themselves to ensure that at the end of the day, the retained firefighting service in this country is fit for purpose and fit to serve us all.

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