Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Ba mhaith liom fáilte a chur roimh an Aire.

As the Minister will be aware, Sinn Féin will continue to play its part in the collective, and importantly all-island, effort in ending the Covid nightmare that our people and people throughout the world have been burdened with for over a year.

On handling the virus, we take our guidance from the medical experts on the measures that are needed to eliminate it. Influenced by the direction from the medical experts, we have offered up solutions to the problems created by the Government in its handling of the Covid-19 emergency. In particular, Sinn Féin proposed amendments to the Government's plans in this health Bill last week in the Dáil. Several amendments were tabled, all of which the Government voted down in the full knowledge that its proposals will merely repeat past failures and will make it much more difficult to get to the point where the people of this nation are safe and societies, both North and South, can be reopened on a confident and secure basis.

While Sinn Féin in the Dáil welcomed the broad thrust of the Bill, and I do the same here today in the Seanad, as other colleagues have said it does not go far enough. The Bill resembles a plan to live with the virus when the plan we need for the betterment of all our people is ultimately to eliminate the virus, and that is not good enough. Last week was a week of confusion and mixed messaging from the Government yet again. Why, for example, was the hotel quarantine Bill handed over to the Department of Health in the first place? This is surely a matter for the Ministry of transport, and not of health. The priority for the Minister for Health should be the roll-out of the vaccination plan, which has been a debacle since the start.

One year after the virus arrived in Ireland, thousands of people in this State and in the North have died from Covid. I, again today, extend my thoughts and sympathies to all those who have lost loved ones as a result of this virus. Tens of thousands of people were infected and on three occasions, societies have been in lockdown with the consequences of which we are all well aware.

Front-line workers continue to be faced with uncertainty as they still face the burden of holding the line while the Government wobbles from one position to the next. Only today, it is shocking to hear the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors state that members of the Garda have had no operational guidance or instructions on how to enforce the quarantine restrictions. In the context of the Garda being expected to check on people who have recently entered this State and who have not engaged with the Department of Health's quarantine process, this is unacceptable.This is unacceptable. According to Garda representatives, the only gardaí enforcing quarantine belong to the Garda National Immigration Bureau, which has conducted some house and hotel visits. In the absence of proper instruction and guidance to gardaí generally, can we hope to see full compliance from those who are not engaging with the Department? Considering the number of people being allowed to enter the State, An Garda Síochána in general will have to be active in enforcing quarantine restrictions. Therefore, through the Minister of Health, I call on the Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, to meet with Garda representative organisations to ensure the Garda Commissioner issues full and clear instructions to the front-line gardaí who have to enforce quarantine guidelines.

This situation and the disgraceful scenes witnessed in Dublin at the weekend, when anti-mask protesters confronted and attacked gardaí on the streets, highlight the need to vaccinate gardaí urgently. Neither I nor the Garda representative organisations are calling for priority to be given to gardaí over more vulnerable sections of society but if gardaí must confront people who refuse to take necessary precautions and indeed spit and cough in their faces, their need to be vaccinated is clear.

The amendments that were rejected in the Dáil last week remain valid. Sinn Féin is putting forward the amendments again here in the Seanad because we are keen to have a proper debate on them and, hopefully, to give Seanadóirí the opportunity to vote in favour of them. The Sinn Féin amendments cover the following crucial areas: practical steps to ensure data is shared North and South to ensure the relevant officials in this State are aware of those who arrive via Belfast, for example, who require to quarantine; to ensure all travellers are required to have a post-arrival polymerase chain reaction, PCR, test; to extend quarantine requirements to all arrivals into the State, not just those from 20 designated states; to ensure the Minister for Health consults the Chief Medical Officer and other Ministers when designing regulations; and to provide for the Dáil to approve the regulations and to put in place a timeframe of seven days for the commencement date of the Act.

We need strong action now to prevent new variants of the virus being imported, as the Minister has said and rightly acknowledged, and to protect the vital vaccination programme over the coming months. That means we have to follow NPHET’s advice, remove discretional movements, have PCR testing post arrival here, extend mandatory hotel quarantine to arrivals from all countries and ensure there is mandatory quarantine for all non-essential arrivals during the Bill’s three-month sunset clause.

Too many mistakes have been made in this Government's international travel policy and lessons must be learned. We need to take measures that will help to allow the people of the State to get back to some level of normal life. The best way we can do that is to drive the virus down and to prevent it and new variants from reseeding. Closing the door to unchecked international travel for the time being should be one part of this plan. Related to the need for more comprehensive mandatory hotel quarantine is the urgent need to expand the checks and balances currently in place. The priority in this regard must be the introduction of a mandatory PCR test post arrival for all non-essential arrivals. This is about closing the net and managing and minimising the risk. We need to ensure passenger data is shared in real time from Belfast to Dublin so that the authorities here know who should be presenting at a designated facility so that An Garda Síochána can contact them if they do not. This makes sense.

With the indulgence of the Cathaoirleach, and seeing as others did not use all of their time, I want to say we need to acknowledge the impact that all of this will have on the aviation sector. The Government has failed to fully support the sector and its workers. The level of State support is a fraction of what is required. Very significant investment will be needed to protect that sector. It should come with conditions to protect workers' jobs and air routes and to deliver on climate change goals. The elimination of the virus should be the number one priority. If Sinn Féin’s amendments are accepted, they will place every one firmly and irreversibly on that road.

I will conclude by responding to Senator Craughwell’s point about the Border. I do not know what the Senator’s obsession is with having boots on the Border, considering that the whole momentum of this State and of political life here has been that one could not and should not be trying to police the Border. A comprehensive fortress Ireland should be in place. If we can do that for animal health, for cattle, it should be in place for people. It is not too late to take that approach.