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

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill. If anything was ever to be learned by people across this country or, indeed, across Europe, it was when there was a bit of an outage in technology a few months ago and nobody was able to use their phone set-up or card set-up. Sometimes people go down a road and it is the cool thing to have this card and swipe everywhere they go. That day, however, people who had a few quid in their pocket were able to buy food if they went into any of the main stores but people with cards could not. It was okay if people went into their local small shops in rural Ireland, thank God, because they would give them something, but if they went into the main stores, there was no way of getting the money sorted. If we ever do anything as politicians, we need to learn from that. We learn from mistakes.

There has been a push from Europe over the last number of years. Before that, however, when we as a country decided or were forced, whichever way anyone wants to put it, to bail out the banking system, once they got the money, they were like the robber, and they ran. They shut the doors in an awful lot of smaller towns in rural Ireland. Ballyhaunis, for example, was a real thriving town that had three banks within a few miles of Knock airport and, one by one, each of the main banking pillars, namely, AIB, Bank of Ireland and Ulster Bank, shut their doors. That has happened in many smaller towns around the country. In fairness, the credit unions have picked up the slack in some of those towns. Sometimes, with a struggle, they put in some cash machines. Many in the banking sector are reluctant to put in cash machines. We need legislation to make sure this is driven on.

Cash is legal tender. When anyone talks about cash, it is nearly a thing that people should not have in their pocket nowadays. It is legal tender. People are allowed to use it wherever they want. It is ironic that even Government Departments, and we often see it in appeals or whatever, ask older farmers who might be getting the pension and paid for something in cash to show where it came out of their account. The reality in many parts of rural Ireland is that people who might be on jobseeker's allowance or on a pension try to keep their post offices going, thankfully. People go into the post office with their card and do whatever they have to do to get out cash. Are people not entitled to pay in whatever way they want for the nuts or bit of fertiliser, over a certain length of time when it is put together because one week would not cover a tonne of fertiliser?

Are you not entitled to do what you want with that? Then a Department that should recognise that cash is legal tender says it wants to see where that came out of a person's bank account. That is not the way it works. We have nearly left a generation of people behind. Not everybody has been left behind, but some people did not have the luxury of perhaps going to school for as long as others or keeping up with technology. That is even the case with me. I see people swiping on their phones, but I do not do it because I do not have a clue how to do it. I am younger than some of the people who were never into that.

There is a perception that there is something wrong if contractors are paid in cash. You can give a receipt. Once you have a receipt and it adds up, there is nothing wrong. The banks have done the same with cheque books. There is a particular cheque book for farmers. It is the greatest thing that was ever devised because there is a duplicate in it that cannot be lost. There was a duplicate of every cheque written out, although it was in lighter writing. All the farmers had to do was throw the cheque book into the accountant who then knew everything they had done all year. They tried to get rid of them as well.

The banks were pushing the idea that people buying cattle at marts should use their cards. They did not want to give them cheque books and, above all things, they did not want them to talk about using cash. We must start going back to be sure, in terms of reliability first of all. If you have a few notes in your pocket, you can go anywhere. You can get diesel, petrol or whatever. You can get grub or whatever you want. It needs to be drummed into people as well that it has to be acceptable to use cash because it is legal tender. There was even a debacle about it last year at the ploughing championships, and that is on the agricultural side. People were expected to book their tickets in advance. They did not really want cash, but then they backed down and took cash. This goes on at concerts and all the different events where they do not want to take cash.

I welcome the introduction of the Bill. The impetus for it is coming from Europe, even though I remember that Draghi guy or someone else a few years ago who said we are moving into a different era. He said that everything will be based on technology and we will all be swiping. We learned a few months ago that swiping does not always work and that we need something behind it to make sure that we are okay.

I support any measure coming forward to enforce the use of cash. From talking to some people in financial institutions, I know that they are getting ready to put in more machines. I welcome that, but they thought they were going to get away with being bailed out, then closing the banks and getting rid of cash. They were the three legs of the stool. Thankfully, it is going to backfire.

I watch young people, including my own, tapping and going. That is the thing. They need to get used to making sure, because they do not realise the consequences for the system if they let something go. The technology does not work all of the time, and then people are left high and dry.

I welcome the legislation. It is a step forward. I encourage the Minister of State to ensure that Departments look again at this because some of them look for receipts, for example, and proof of where money came out of a bank, such as in the case of agricultural appeals. If you get money out of the post office, it will not show up. That is the case if you pick up your pension.

See this speech in context