Sharon Keogan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with Senator Joe Conway.

The Minister of State is welcome. Across the country, we had close to 1 million buildings without electricity. There is estimated damage of over €200 million to homes, roads and infrastructure as well as over €500 million in damage to the timber and horticultural industries. In my home constituency of Meath East, there are still homes that are lacking telephone lines over a month later.

As has been said at length in this House, we have seen the result of the Government's tendency to take a reactive emergency response approach instead of a proactive emergency prevention or minimisation one, but in the spirit of being proactive, I call on the Government to make a number of improvements for the future. One improvement would be for it to ensure that every school was provided with a generator. As the Covid pandemic taught us, it is paramount that children's routines be maintained in the face of interruptions.

Another area in which we can make immediate improvements is to assist the local emergency response groups. I call on the Minister of State to co-operate with the Minister, Dara Calleary, to make grants available through Pobal for community alert groups to stock up on emergency ESB kits for the elderly and those living alone.

More broadly, we need to move away from our overcentralised emergency response system and towards a system of regionalised emergency response and prevention. Our current system of local execution and national oversight is not efficient. Is it necessary for Dublin to begin delegating more responsibilities and competencies to the regional level? Leaving too many elements of emergency response in the hands of the national-level Government can result in fatal delays. We saw this several months ago during the tragic floods in Valencia in Spain. There, delays and confusion between Madrid and the regional government of Valencia aggravated the crisis, making it one of the deadliest in Spanish history. I fear that, with too many competences left in the hands of the national-level bodies, Ireland is waiting to experience a Valencia-level disaster of its own when the next Storm Éowyn comes. Too many local response groups that are ready to help can get stuck waiting on delayed support or permission to come down the line from Dublin. Ireland desperately needs to apply the principle of subsidiarity in its emergency response, as it does in many areas. Regional response and preparation groups will know far better what they need and will be able to work much more closely with their communities.

In short, how can the Government prevent another Storm Éowyn from happening? The two words are "preparation" and "delegation".

By the way, I also commend the Minister of State, Deputy Michael Healy-Rae, on the fantastic work that he has done with the forestry sector since 29 January. People need to be aware of that. The Deputy is only in the job a month and he has done fantastically. We are dealing with 24,000 ha of forestry.