Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am sure Members will agree with me when I express my solidarity with our healthcare professionals, who dealt with Covid-19 for the past 14 to 15 months and the stresses, strains, difficulties and challenges associated with that and who then faced the most unprecedented cyberattack in the history of the State, affecting 85,000 computers. I commend our healthcare professionals and their supervisors and managers on their unstinting commitment to ensuring that the impact on patients will be kept to a minimum. It is impossible to eliminate any and all effects on patients and appointments but they have done a stellar job in terms of ensuring that testing, tracing and testing and the vaccine roll-out have not been affected by this scurrilous and terrible attack on our State and the most vulnerable people in it.

I again wish to refer to aviation, a matter about which the Leader has spoken extensively in the past. Aviation is critical for our country, not just in terms of the number of people it employs but also in the context of the critical role it will play in kick-starting our economy. Ours is an island nation. That is the reality. Connectivity is critical for our country and is in large part achieved by means of aviation. I understand that a memorandum will be brought to Cabinet tomorrow in respect of reducing the impact of mandatory hotel quarantine and to remove it for a number of, if not all, European states. However, I am still waiting for meaningful short-, medium- and long-term plans regarding how we are going to assist our aviation industry in getting out of the situation in which it currently finds itself. This morning, Ryanair announced a loss of €850 million for last year.Ryanair revolutionised air travel in this country and made it affordable for and accessible to people. That is just an example of the enormous uphill challenge facing our aviation industry. We need to keep our finger on the pulse and force the Government into action.