Brian Ó Domhnaill (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Some of the residents of the island are visiting Leinster House today. They are currently gathering outside the gates of Leinster House to protest their shocking treatment at the hands of the Minister of State with responsibility for the Gaeltacht and his Department in the awarding of a contract for the ferry service to the island. This ferry service has operated for many decades. However, the tender is up on 31 March. Therefore, a new service must be put in place by 1 April.

It was recently tendered, but the tender did not include any specification regarding the vessel to provide the service, despite the requests of the island community, which numbers 119 residents. Therefore, the tender was awarded to a 42-year-old vessel which, the islanders maintain, is neither seaworthy nor safe. It is shocking. The Department and the Minister of State invoking taxpayers' money, then turned around and said they would give the residents a grant to build a new boat. This would take three years. Meanwhile, on 1 April 2018, there would be no service. It is shocking.

The Minister of State and the Department have thus far failed to recognise the concerns of the island community. Five or six families have said they will leave the island come 31 March if this is not resolved. This would take five or six families from a population of 119 people. The Government is talking this week about protecting rural Ireland and launching the national planning framework while at the same time presiding over shocking treatment and a tender process that is clearly neither efficient nor effective and does not represent value for money for the taxpayer. I therefore ask the Leader to call the Minister of State and Government Chief Whip before the House to explain what the hell is going on with this service because it is clearly not good enough. It is wrong for a Government Minister of State to go around willy-nilly allocating and promising money to build up people's hopes while the people whom he is trying to fool have their lives to live on an island 9 miles off our coast. It is totally unacceptable.