Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. This is the first time I have had the opportunity to welcome him here. Prior to the Minister of State coming to this House, he was knee-deep in water trying to assist communities. His response in Donegal was second to none. He was in the area within hours of what occurred and he reassured the community. I have tremendous respect for the position he has taken and the work he has done. He is to be complimented on it. His job is a difficult one. I do not know of any other Minister that has been asked to act as King Canute to keep the tide out. That is certainly what the Minister of State, Deputy Moran, is being asked to do.

Senator Paddy Burke is correct that this generation has witnessed the changes. I recall the Saturday morning of Hurricane Debbie in the 1960s. It was a beautiful morning but by 9 p.m. the promenade in Salthill, which is close to where I live, was flooded. In those days, to get to school I had to walk down Threadneedle Road, along the promenade and up Dalysfort Road. Flooding was something we rarely saw up as far as my house but frequently saw along the promenade. While we must take climate change seriously, we cannot stop flooding overnight. Senator Burke is correct that large carbon guzzling countries like the United States, China and so on have a huge responsibility to the rest of the world to clean up their acts. We will clean up ours. I know the Minister of State and the Government are committed to doing that.

There is no doubt that we face further floods and all types of damage as we move forward. We are told that Hurricane Ophelia is a taste of what is to come. One of my concerns, which I voiced yesterday to the House and I wish to bring to the attention of the Minister of State today, is our lack of preparedness for a major crisis such as the flooding in Donegal and Hurricane Ophelia. The Minister of State was quick off the mark in Donegal. I recall ringing a county councillor in Donegal that morning and suggesting to him that a Bailey bridge be sought for Donegal to replace one of the bridges that had been swept away. That Bailey bridge had to be brought from Cork to Donegal and put in place by troops from the Curragh. We were told - we heard this previously in relation to flooding in the United States - that a corps of engineers was in place. Our corps of engineers was cut by one third during the 2012 reorganisation of the Defence Forces. There are 102 members of the corps of engineers. The truth is that there are 30 available today.

In regard to chainsaw operators, we were told yesterday these were available from the Defence Forces. There are two qualified chainsaw operators north of the line Dublin to Galway. There are ten heavy plant assets available to the Defence Forces, only two of which are operational because we do not have trained personnel. I sometimes think the Minister of State is operating with his hands tied behind his back. In terms of civil powers, the Defence Forces is his last line of assistance.We must step back and consider what we have done to the Defence Forces over the past five years. A total of 3,000 members have walked out, highly qualified, trained people who we have replaced with recruits. What is now happening of course is that half of the recruits are walking out before they have finished their training. The Minister of State needs the kind of help that he can always rely on. We saw this during Storm Ophelia. When the HSE needed to move staff in the storm, it was the Defence Forces who came to the rescue. Rather than criticise the Minister of State, I ask him instead to go back and talk to the Cabinet and explain to them that we need to be prepared for what is coming. Bailey bridges should be available in Athlone and in Donegal; we should not have to wait for one to be dragged across the country. It is time we sat down and reappraised the reorganisation of the Defence Forces, which was an unmitigated disaster. It leaves Ministers like Deputy Moran, who are out there on the front line trying to meet the needs of communities, with their hands tied behind their backs.

I visited the National Ploughing Championships, as I am sure the Minister of State did himself, and I saw there some of the recent innovations that have been developed to deal with flooding. The Office of Public Works, OPW, should look at some of the solutions put forward and should start appraising what it believes could be recommended to households and to communities. I saw some very interesting approaches there but of course I am not qualified to judge whether they might be of any value. They certainly looked really good. The OPW needs to step up to the mark in this regard and appraise the various possibilities available in the country and draw up a list of recommended flooding solutions. We have to do something for the future here but we must also deal with the world in which we are living and must provide the citizens with the security they need. This may also mean relocating families and razing houses to the ground that are simply too close to water and in areas that are too low-lying.

I thank the Minister of State for his work and the people of the country will do the same. I spoke to people in County Donegal who were blown away by the speed at which the Minister of State arrived up there to meet them, so I compliment him on that.