Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will start by wishing our usher, Mr. Tony Maher, the very best for the future in his retirement. I thank him for his courtesy to all of us in the House and in the Labour Party down through the years. I also thank him for his constant help and guidance throughout those years. We wish him the best in his retirement. The real work now starts with the grandchildren. He will be wishing he could come back in here in a couple of weeks time, trust me. The very best wishes from all of us.

I am sharing time with my colleague from Limerick, Deputy Conor Sheehan. We will take seven and a half minutes each.

I will commence my discussion of the programme for Government by focusing on how it will be implemented. I will not go through everything in it but I will look at some issues which I feel should be dealt with but which are not in it, or are not in it to a sufficient level.

First, there is a lot of good stuff in the programme for Government. There is much where there can be mutual agreement on the issues involved. There is also loads of stuff which we would totally disagree with and there is also stuff where we believe there is simply not enough emphasis. I will go through some of that later. There is also an issue as to how this is going to be implemented given the three components of this Government and the question of transparency regarding how that is going to happen. That will be my focus over the term of this Government, over the term of the new capital development plan and over the new HSE plan, in relation to which, coincidentally, Ministers cannot under law direct the HSE. The board of the HSE are independent and separate from the Government. A Minister for Health cannot actually direct the HSE on these issues. They can talk and guide, but they cannot direct.

I believe the transparency of decision-making on the capital plan for this country needs to be reviewed. Such a review is always needed from time to time. The way in which that is done and the interaction between the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform and the other Departments and the relevant State agencies needs to be very transparent too. That is an issue on which the Labour Party and I will focus minutely with regard to every State agency and Department.

In the area of justice, we have a crisis in An Garda Síochána. I represent Templemore and I know all about it. It is the worst crisis we have ever had on Garda numbers and it is getting worse. From recent figures, I know that these numbers are decreasing again and people are resigning. I will not rephrase the whole thing about recruitment and retention but we need a whole new plan on how we will have a functioning Garda Síochána. It is not in this programme for Government. It states 5,000 gardaí. There is not a hope or prayer of that. Gardaí are demoralised. They do not feel that they have the support. Their pay, pensions, entitlements and lifestyle are all at rock bottom. Until that is addressed, we will not be able to deal with it the crisis I have mentioned.

There is also statement in the programme for Government looking at other training facilities across the State. A site of over 200 acres out the road in Clonmore was bought a number of years ago. It is beside the Garda College. That is where the expansion should happen, right beside the college.

On health, we have serious issues from a capital point of view on the requirement for elective hospitals, the National Maternity Hospital, the national children's hospital. My colleague Deputy Sheehan and myself will be beating the drum with regard to UHL and the need for another accident and emergency facility in the mid-west. There are some very simple things which can be done. This must be the tenth time I have mentioned one of them in here. I really wish the Minister, Deputy Chambers, was here to hear this because this proposal will save the taxpayer money as well as being good policy. It is this: we need employment orders in healthcare and, for instance, for home help. Every Deputy in here deals with this issue. A person can get as many hours as he or she wants but it is pointless because the workers are not there. The reason they are not there is that people will not do the work because it is not paid well and it is difficult work at times.

However, many people would be willing to do it if the conditions were better. We need an employment order on the rate of pay, travel, meals and other allowances. An employment order would mean more people would work and more people would stay at home so the taxpayer would not get caught for more people going into nursing homes and more people ending up in acute care which can cost €1,600 per night. I received an answer to a parliamentary question which demonstrated that thousands of people end up spending three, six and up to nine months and longer in acute settings at €1,600 per night who should not be there. This is financially the right thing to do and from a healthcare point of view it is the right thing to do.

I will jump into a few more things. The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, CCPC, needs to be completely gutted. First, it needs to be separated into two bodies. It is not fit for purpose. The Government's document says it is looking into separating the functions because many issues are not being dealt with promptly. We almost need Joe Duffy to raise issues before they end up being dealt with by the commission. It is ridiculous. I have sympathy for the staff though. They simply do not have enough resources. In fact, they have said so.

It really annoyed me that the last Government and the previous one did not progress offshore wind. Offshore wind is our oil. The fact that the designated maritime area plans, DMAPs, have not been progressed to the level required is wrong. I am delighted that a very capable Minister of State is now in charge of it and will focus on it. However, the timelines around which this is planned simply do not meet our requirements as a State and that needs to be re-examined.

These are only the issues I wanted to raise. There are many more. One other issue is rural transport. People often give out about the Green Party. I did when it was in the last Government, but it did not get everything wrong. Progress was made on rural transport. It is important to acknowledge that and to accept, in fairness to the Green Party, it did that. However, we have a real emergency and more of it is required in the area of taxis and rural hackneys. A completely new rural hackney licence is needed for rural Ireland because it is impossible to get taxis across the country, as it is in urban areas.

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