Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Like Senator Clifford-Lee, I welcome the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, to the House and commend him on the very difficult job he is doing and the manner in which he is doing it. Time will tell. It has been challenging and difficult, and nobody has got everything right, but, by and large, everything that could be done has been done. In the fullness of time, we will have a review of all of the measures. There will be a set of learnings and that set of learnings will influence how we do things in future pandemics.

I want to make clear that this country has performed very well when we look at other countries. Sadly, too many people have lost their lives, but many more would have lost their lives had we not taken the measures we took. It is with a heavy heart, and I am sure the Minister shares my view, that we come before this House having to renew these emergency measures. It is not something that any Government wants to do, not something any Minister wants to propose and not something any Oireachtas wants to pass. Unfortunately, however, in order to protect human life, to protect our citizens and to ensure the most vulnerable are protected as much as possible, it is necessary.

Nobody foresaw that this pandemic was going to last as long as it has lasted but that is the reality. There have been very many variants, including the UK variant that caused the deadly third wave in January, and we now have the Indian variant, which was very well described by Tony Holohan as being a black cloud on the horizon of a blue sky. We need to acknowledge when things have been got right, and things have been got right.

I am delighted that I will be going back to County Clare on Wednesday to get the vaccine. I registered on the portal on Friday of last week, when the turn for my age arrived, and I got a text yesterday. A turnaround of two or three days is pretty remarkable. Some 300,000 vaccines were administered last week, so the commitment of 250,000 a week for the month of May has certainly been achieved and surpassed.

I commend all GP practices throughout the country. They administered the vaccines with huge efficiency and with great empathy, and put hope and joy into people's arms. It was great to get the feedback and to hear the stories of people going to their GP to get their vaccinations. The GPs played a very important role in the administration of the Covid-19 vaccine, as have the amazing men and women who work in the vaccine centres throughout the country, who have done phenomenal work as well.

It has been said and it is the case that the vaccine is the only way out of this pandemic. However, it is important to reiterate also the public health advice on the simple things like, where possible, working from home, keeping one's distance and staying 2 m apart, and observing hand washing and the various hygiene measures. I suggest that some of those measures, in particular in regard to sanitising stations and so on, are here to stay because it is good public health practice. I would like to see public buildings, supermarkets, hotels and so on continuing to provide sanitation stations for people to sanitise their hands when we return to normal. Certainly, one of the learnings from this pandemic is that sanitising hands reduces the spread of infection.

We have all seen the benefits of working from home. Having people work remotely has played an important part in suburban areas of the cities but particularly in rural towns.There is a man I meet in Lahinch every morning as he gets a newspaper and a scone. He used to work in a city. He has been working from home for the past 12 months and would hope to continue working from home in future, because he can do the work he was doing in the office easily from his home in Lahinch. That means an extra €5 per day is being spent in the local shop. It is helping with the carbon footprint and quality of life.

I support the Bill before the House today but only with a heavy heart because it is necessary. I hope it will be the last time we put forward and vote on such draconian emergency measures in the House.