Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister will be very familiar with what I am going to say. I acknowledge the work he has done on this scheme so far but we need to tidy it up and sort out the inconsistencies. As my colleague Deputy Kerrane was just saying, some people are getting some while others are getting nothing at all. Tonight, I got a message from somebody whose roof was really damaged and who has been waiting a month and a half. We have to find a way. I do not know if the Minister has resources within the Department or needs to bring them in but we cannot have so many open ends with regard to the scheme three months after the storm. That is the humanitarian scheme. There are lots of things to be done. We need to make sure that everybody is paid. The Minister will want everyone in County Mayo to get paid, just as I do. We do not want them to be given anything they are not entitled to but the damage that has been done should be covered. This might relate to the food in their freezers, what they had to spend while they had no power or other expenses directly resulting from storm damage. I still do not have an Eir connection and, however many months after the storm, I do not know when it will be back. I have to try to make things work while on a Zoom meeting and it is impossible. We want to encourage people to work from home. We cannot expect them to work from home if we do not have consistency.

I have also talked to the Minister about the generators that are needed. He will know Clare Island. We really need a generator for the health centre there. That is urgent and important. Lives depend on it. We can do this but we need to concentrate on it over the coming days and weeks.

My colleagues and I will work with the Minister to make sure everybody gets what they are entitled to. People put it to me all the time, as I am sure they put it to him, that this would be treated much differently if it happened in Dublin. We want equity for people in the west when they experience this kind of damage. I also refer to small businesses. A lot was promised at the time but no scheme has been delivered for businesses or farmers. Deputy O'Reilly mentioned the case of the oyster fishermen who lost €160,000 but other fishermen also have genuine losses. There is no point talking about insurance because some of these are not insured and, in other cases, the excess may be €2,000, which they just cannot afford. We are in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis so I really want to get this sorted out in the coming days and weeks.

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