Eugene Murphy (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I begin by expressing my sincere good wishes to the Minister of State, Deputy Troy, who has been a good friend in politics for many years and lives not far from me in the Longford-Westmeath constituency. He has always been a very good worker in the constituency and he did some tremendous work on the Front Bench for Fianna Fáil in recent times.

I agree with Senator Bacik and others that this is, in effect, a technical Bill. We have to remember that we are dealing with the extraordinary situation of a pandemic and, quite rightly in situations like this, we need to get the legislation through. Earlier this morning, very genuine concerns were expressed in the Chamber about rushing legislation through. Doing so is not something that I or my colleagues on this side of the House would be happy with at all. However, there are circumstances we have to deal with in this moment. The reason this legislation is being dealt with very speedily is the number of people who are unemployed and the threats that remain in terms of getting people back to work. While Senator Gavan made a very eloquent speech and I agree with him in regard to the Debenhams workers and other points he made, I genuinely do not think this is about company directors. The Government is worried about people not getting back to work. If that is going to be frustrated because AGMs cannot be held or things have changed in terms of how companies do their business, then the reality is that if there is no company, there is no work. No work means that the economy will slide further into recession.

As I said, I acknowledge some of the points Senator Gavan made. I absolutely agree with him in regard to what happened in the meat factories. There is no doubt that the guard was let down in that case and the right things were not being done. However, we would all agree that things have improved, as is only proper and right. We now have officials from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the Department of Health going into the factories and there has been a big improvement in terms of how those factories operate, which is very important. This Bill is generally dealing with the present crisis and that is often the case when certain legislation is rushed through the Houses.

Senator Gavan also made some fine points about co-operatives. However, from talking to business people in my constituency - mainly small business owners - and talking to my own accountant, it is clear to me that the owners of small businesses are very worried about how their five, six, eight or ten employees will be fixed in the months ahead. They are desperately trying to reopen and re-establish themselves and a lot of small business directors really and genuinely worry about having the money at the end of the week to pay their workers. I make that point because it is often misunderstood in the debates we have. Business directors are very conscious of having the money to pay their five, six, eight or ten employees at the end of the week and how important that is in keeping their businesses going.

I acknowledge that the July stimulus package may be disappointing to some, but it is a huge development in terms of trying to rectify some of the appalling situations we are facing as a result of the Covid pandemic. We had a busy debate here yesterday about the moneys that are being made available. I accept that some of the provision will be in the form of loans, but several of the small business owners I have spoken to tell me that if the banks co-operate and they can access those loans, they will be very helpful to them. As we know, if something goes wrong, the banks will take only a 20% hit on these loans, while the State and taxpayers will take an 80% hit. We also have the €5 billion EU Brexit fund coming down the road. I accept that not all of it will go to Ireland, but there is no doubt that the bulk of the fund will come to us because we are the member state most affected by Brexit.

A very important point was made about broadband provision. I agree that if we do not get that right for all parts of the country, urban as well as rural, a lot of this legislation will not work. I am glad to see that the Minister is looking at speeding up the process of broadband provision.We need to get the hubs up and running as quickly as possible. The broadband challenge is one that has to be dealt with very quickly. I welcome the Bill. I understand the frustration of some Members but, again, I remind them that we are in unprecedented times which none of us has seen in our lifetimes. We have to think about the here and now in the hope that the future will be different and brighter.