Martin Kenny
Sligo-Leitrim · Sinn Féin · Ireland
“A debate here for a couple of hours is fine, but I remember being involved in some of the deep talks with people in the early days of the peace process. We sat in rooms and talked about reconciliation. I met Garret FitzGerald on many occasions at the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation.”
“Of course, we have the areas of natural constraint payments that most farmers on this side of the Border avail of. Unfortunately, those payments are no longer available in the North. Sinn Féin has recommended that the payments should be restored. Farmers need support. Brexit took their support away.”
“I welcome this debate. Such a debate has been needed for quite a long time. The reality is that for many people, the issue of the financial implications of Irish unity has been used as a put-down to try to smother or put a stop to argument and debate. This is a welcome way in which we can open that up.”
“I hope Government will reflect on that and recognise that we need to build a process. There is an energy for reunification among ordinary people the length and breadth of the country. This is about the physical constraints, but is also about identity. Many people who live on this island have a British identity.”
“As the Taoiseach is aware, for many years people with mental health issues have been attending emergency departments in our hospitals. Many of them get very poor outcomes. They experience long delays and end up on trolleys. Sometimes they are referred for short-term stays or to community services, which offer little or no service.”
“I appreciate all that and the farmers forum is a positive advancement on things, but we are back to the problem at the very core of this issue, which is that the chair of Bord Bia has been using imported beef from Brazil as part of his mix to sell product.”
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“Another farmer, perhaps in another part of the country where there are much larger holdings, could have a larger portion that is peatland and yet none of it would be designated as peatland because the farmer has a larger portion of mineral-rich soils. A scheme needs to be brought in that will protect the carbon-rich soils without creating a situation where we disenfranchise farmers on smaller holdings, which is what this approach will do.”
“I thank the Minister. It was pretty much the reply I had expected. To be honest, I do not agree. The parcel is well understood, everyone knows what it is and it is there for several other schemes, but in GAEC 8 and GAEC 9 relating to Natura 2000 lands, for example, one can red-line out the area. There is no reason that cannot be done when it comes to peatlands as well. There is no reason we cannot come up with a solution to designate the peatlands only and leave the mineral-rich soils apart from them. This is going to have a detrimental effect on people, particularly those on smaller holdings. Consider the farmer who has 25 ha or 30 ha and 50% of that is peatland. All of that is designated.”
“I welcome the Minister and all his colleagues here and wish them all the very best in their term in office in the Department of agriculture. My question is on GAEC 2 and how peatlands and mineral-rich soils are being designated under that scheme. As the Minister knows, the proposal sent to Europe is that if a parcel of land has 50% or more of peatlands all of the parcel will be considered as peatland. This is very unfair and will have a really detrimental effect particularly in areas along the west coast and in the north west.”
“When there is a big crisis like this, a scheme is needed that can ramp up to meet requirements. That needs to happen with urgency.”
“A lot of these community centres were the places people went to when they got power restored but they had to wait perhaps a week before that happened. There should be a scheme for them to have generators in place so that if a crisis like this happens again, it is somewhere people can go to charge their phone batteries or get a cup of tea or whatever. People were in real crisis. The issue with water was also a serious problem. When power went down, many people were left without water as well. I had no electricity for 13 days. My mother had none for 15 days and she is 92 years of age. That was common across our part of the country. This is a real issue. There was discussion about having a scheme in place but the scheme will only work in limited circumstances.”
“Last week, I accompanied a number of people with a delegation from Leitrim County Council to meet the Minister of State, Deputy Healy-Rae, in this regard. It is a real issue that must be dealt with urgently so that we can ensure that critical power and communications infrastructure is protected, particularly where it runs through forestry. The people who own the forestry throw their hands up in the air and say there is nothing they can do about it. The ESB says it can do nothing about it. Everybody seems to be passing the buck to someone else. We need firm regulation to ensure the existing corridors are opened up and that where new forests are going in, wide corridors are left for infrastructure to go through. I mentioned the various community organisations that came together.”
“I understand the storm was unprecedented and different from anything we had ever seen in the past but many of us, including my colleague here from Sligo-Leitrim, have seen it very often because many of the problems we had, particularly with power outages, related to the forestry problem. There are lines going through forests where the edge of the tree corridor is not far enough back, causing trees to bring down lines when they come down. Hundreds of people were left without power for weeks on end waiting for it to be restored. The reality is that, if there were the same kind of storm in a week's time, the same thing would happen because those trees are still there waiting to fall on the same lines.”
“I commend the many thousands of people around the country who put their shoulder to the wheel throughout the storm, including those in voluntary groups and agencies across the State who came out, the ESB workers and county council workers who worked day and night to get things moving again and the ordinary people and farmers who went out to cut bushes along the roads and took trees off the roads with their tractors to try to clear the place for people. The humanitarian assistance scheme has been a real problem. The Minister has to acknowledge that. Many people made applications and thought they were going to get somewhere but were just turned down without any explanation. It is as if the system was just overwhelmed by what happened.”
“As others have mentioned, Ireland has a long tradition of being neutral. This tradition is recognised globally as giving us strength and uniqueness and allows us to be seen as an honest broker in many situations. However, we also need to have our own security positioned in place with a military force that can respond and protect our airspace and undersea cables. Our navy is at a really low ebb at the moment. There is a great deal of work to be done in respect of building and growing all that. I will come back to the point I opened with on the situation in Gaza. The Government needs to be seen to be standing very strong in respect of that. The occupied territories Bill is the one Bill we can put forward, united across the House, to deal with that situation in an effective way and show leadership globally.”
“I am sure the Minister of State will have an opportunity to come back in at the end. We have to recognise that this would be detrimental to the livelihoods of Irish farmers. In that context, we must be very strong and definite in respect of what we are doing around all of that. Going back to issues of international security and cybersecurity, from time to time a red flag jumps up when there has been an attack somewhere but we need to recognise that it is an ongoing problem. Every day, the capacity of those actors is growing to attack and undermine our facilities, whether it be our water, telecommunications or power infrastructure, or the infrastructure of any Government agency across the State. We need a combative sense of how we are going to deal with it. That brings me to the issue of international and security co-operation.”
“They need to see some action on this and must have some level of protection with regard to the tariffs that are being talked about. On international trade, we also have the issue of the Mercosur trade deal, which is still on the table. Farmers and many others in my constituency and across the country feel that we will have Irish beef products produced to the highest standards competing with products produced to the lowest standards. It is unfair and unsustainable. There needs to be recognition of that. I would welcome if the Government would come out and say it is opposed in totality to the Mercosur trade deal. We have to oppose it in totality. If we are not----”
“The Bill has to be enforceable, yes, but it must clearly demonstrate the Government's and the world's absolute outrage at what is happening in Gaza and in the occupied territories across Palestine. Turning to other issues, the tariffs being brought in by the United States were to be on steel and aluminium first. Then the European Union talked about tariffs on whisky coming from America, then they retorted with tariffs on Irish whiskey products and products coming from the European Union, with talk of 200% tariffs. All of this is very volatile and difficult. In my own constituency we have The Shed Distillery in Drumshanbo. Pat Rigney was on the radio the other morning talking about this. It is a clear problem for many small, indigenous companies, large portions of whose products are exported to the United States.”
“The services that come from the occupied territories are also a major part of that economy. An occupied territories Bill that excludes services is not going to cut the mustard. That has to be clear.”
“The situation in Gaza is at the forefront of everyone’s mind today and in recent days. We have seen the mass bombing of thousands of people who are living in rubble as it stands. The attitude of the Israeli Government and its efforts to wipe out the Palestinian people is something the whole world is rightly aghast at. I recognise that Ireland has been to the forefront in recognising the State of Palestine and other measures but there are other distances we can go in respect of that. The issue of the occupied territories Bill has been raised here. We need to see a clear commitment from the Government that the Bill be enacted in full. In respect of the United States and the trade deficit we have there, we have looked at services as being a big part of that.”
“I know of dozens of cases where people have received notices to quit and where the local authority is prepared to buy the houses involved. However, they have not had from the Minister the clarity that might allow them to do so. This is what we need to do. The Minister needs to support the motion. The Minister of State moved an amendment to the motion. On the basis of what usually happens, this means the Government, in some backhanded way, is going to oppose the motion and go off and do its own thing anyway. What the Government has done up to now has been a failure. I ask that the Minister does not continue with that failure. He is new to the position. I ask him to start as he means to go on and show that he is about something different that will deliver for the people who need delivery.”
“I respect that the Minister of State was talking about a circular coming out. Why is that taking so long? Where is it? Where is the sense of urgency to deliver for people? Why have local authorities not been clear? The Minister of State indicated that the Government will bring clarity. What is it taking so long to provide clarity? Why delay and delay? Why can we not have it now? Why can people not know where they stand? Why can local authorities not know how much money they will have in order that they can purchase houses and take people out of their misery? What is happening is hugely stressful. Dozens of people across my constituency are affected. I live in a rural area that does not have the same housing pressures as many of our urban areas.”
“I wish the Minister well in his post . I commend my colleagues on bringing forward this motion. The tenant in situ scheme, as many have said, worked very well for many people who were under serious pressure. Since last summer, however, we have seen decline. Now, it has ground to a halt. Many people in my constituency have been affected. I am aware of the case of a young woman who has four children. She is a nurse. Due to the fact that her children are small, she cannot go to work. Her husband works in the fire brigade in our town. They are living in a rented house and have received a notice to quit, which is valid. They are going to have to leave the house. They can find nowhere else to go. The tenant in situ scheme is the only option they have. Up to now, they have been told that it is not open and that there is nothing for them.”
“Tess and Dan in Carrigallen still have no phone line and they were four weeks without power. I want to particularly mention Terence in north Leitrim, who is an elderly man living up in the hills. He has been without a phone line. He is very vulnerable and has a lot of home help coming in to him, but he cannot get Open Eir to put the phone line back. I know that ComReg has a role and the Minister has a role. It is totally inappropriate that critical infrastructure like this has not been replaced six weeks after a storm.”
“I want to raise the issue of the storms six weeks ago. Most people in my part of the country were without power for some time, some for a long time, and dozens of people still have no phone line, in particular elderly people living in rural areas. Dorothy, who is in her 80s and living in north Leitrim, has no phone line and had no electricity for three weeks. She has a panic button in case she falls or anything happens in her home because she is elderly, but it does not work without a landline. Open Eir is supposed to be bringing in these landlines, putting up poles and so on, but it is not doing it and that is not happening for many people. Kathleen was 38 days without power and still has no phone service. Rosemary, a woman in Aughavas who has a child with disabilities, only got her phone service back the day before yesterday.”
“I will come back to the Minister of State with the specifics in respect of the case but the truth is that there are thousands of children across the country who cannot get access to CAMHS. I appreciate that there are more people being recruited but it does not meet the demand or come anywhere near meeting the demand. In team one in the Sligo, Leitrim region, the CAMHS team has no clinical lead. Having no clinical lead means that when a GP refers a child who needs a service, he or she gets a letter back saying "Sorry, there is no service. Go to accident and emergency." If the Minister of State thinks that is a good service being provided by the Government, then she needs to cop herself on.”
“They had a child who also needed a referral but was informed that there is no access for the child to go to CAMHS. The letter, which came back to the family, said that if the child's mental health situation deteriorated, they had to go to the accident and emergency services. That is totally inappropriate. The Minister of State has said that this is her priority, but nobody sees that priority on the ground.”
“The CAMHS issue is an issue across the country. The Minister of State mentioned that it is one of her priorities. I will provide a second example in respect of CAMHS. A family's GP sent a letter to CAMHS to refer a child who needed to get into CAMHS. They received correspondence stating that there was no clinical lead for the CAMHS post in CHO 1, which covers Leitrim, east Sligo and west Cavan. The GP received a letter back saying that the child could not get a place in CAMHS and could not even be put on the waiting list to go into CAMHS. This is the situation across the country, but it is particularly acute in the Sligo-Leitrim region. There is no CAMHS service for any child. The principal in the local school in Ballinamore wrote to me regarding this.”
“I submitted a question on the issue of the MHID CAMHS consultant, but it was wrongly interpreted as referring to a "mental health information database" consultant rather than a "mental health intellectual disability" consultant. The intellectual disability service is required. We raised the issue in the Chamber several times of a child called Maggie in Drumshanbo, County Leitrim, who was referred to the intellectual disability team, which has not existed. The first person recruited - the consultant - to that team was recruited last November and only stayed a week because there were no services other than herself. Now, they are trying to recruit somebody else. This question is about intellectual disability teams and services.”
“The guidelines in place are far too strict for people to be able to build houses in their own communities to sustain those communities and keep them going. Finally, I will speak about Irish Water or Uisce Éireann. Uisce Éireann charges people for putting in water connections. If it is more than 10 m, that charge per metre is absolutely massive and is a deterrent for people to be able to build their own homes. There needs to be a review of that so people can get connections, particularly in rural areas where water connections may be for further distances than 10 m.”
“There are many people on HAP and who are renting houses from local authorities and have had notices to quit and have to leave. The previous Government had a scheme where the local authority could buy these houses but they cannot do that now. When will this scheme be put back in place because there are loads of people in my constituency, including a nurse who has four small children, living in a house with a notice to quit? The local authority wants to buy the house but there is nothing there with which to do so. The other issue I will mention is rural housing, which has been has been mentioned several times. I come from a part of the country where there is massive decline in the rural population. The population is going down and down and down every year and we need to be able to build rural housing.”
“We need to see thousands and thousands more houses built to have any hope of being able to break the back on this. The other sector we talk about, which was mentioned by several of the TDs opposite, was affordable rent, affordable purchase and affordable housing. The problem is that affordable housing is not available practically anywhere in the country outside of the capital city. Where it is available it is not affordable. It is as simple as that. We are talking about almost half a million euro for a house that is being called affordable. People need to wake up and recognise the policies the Government has had up to now have been a total and absolutely dismal failure. I want to raise a number of specific issues because I think they are very important. First, is the renting of houses.”
“I welcome the debate and wish both Ministers all the best in their new portfolios. However, one of the things that is very difficult to listen to from both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael is that they are the parties for homeownership. It is striking because since Fine Gael came into government almost 14 years ago, and was supported by Fianna Fáil over the past number of years, in every subsequent census homeownership in Ireland has declined. It has gone down and down and homelessness has increased and continues to increase. We have three sectors in Ireland. One is the private market where homeownership is what we want to see with people being able to buy their homes and progress - but very few are. We also have social housing, which we do not have enough of anywhere in the country.”
“These are the issues we need to deal with. They need to be treated with a sense of urgency, rather than continually passing the buck. We are asking for the implementation of a strategic plan to achieve the magic ten-week target for the waiting list. That is what needs to happen. I recognise that the Government is not going to oppose the motion but that is not enough. The Minister needs to act on it and deliver ten-week waiting times. That is the least people should expect.”
“Many children living in rural areas cannot get a school bus. People need their car to bring their children to school. This particularly affects younger couples when one of them has to get a driving licence. Recently, a doctor who returned from America contacted our office. He could not transfer his US licence and ended up for several months having to get a taxi to call into the hospital when he was working late nights and to travel to and from work. If he wanted to drive a car, he had to get somebody who was a qualified driver to travel with him. It is preposterous that people who return from the US cannot get their driving licences transferred over. This needs to be resolved. I know the Minister agrees with me on that but why has it not been resolved?”
“It is outrageous. People who live in rural communities and areas simply cannot manage without their car. They need it to get to work. For young people starting out, the car is the only method they have of travelling because we do not have the public transport infrastructure that urban areas have. It needs to be recognised that the Government has dropped the ball in respect of this. To pass the buck to the RSA and say it has not done this or that or that everything has been done that can be done simply does not stand up. We need to recognise that we have an awful lot of work to do. People need their car to get to work or to hospital appointments and to get their children to school. The Government cuts transport in every other way. Every September, Deputies fight in this Chamber to get pupils on school buses.”
“When I held the transport portfolio, which is about a year and a half ago now, the Minister's predecessor, Deputy Jack Chambers, told me this was all being solved, sorted out and going in the right direction. I remember him standing here and telling us that more driving test instructors were being recruited, more testing centres would be opened and everything was in hand and would be sorted out. The truth is that we have gone in the opposite direction since then. The figures bear this out. There are more than 72,000 people now on the waiting list, which is the longest it has ever been. Some have been on the waiting list for up to eight months. It simply is not good enough. Someone applying for a driving test today in Sligo would wait seven months to get one. Someone applying for one in Leitrim today would wait up to six months to get one.”
“With electricity power lines running through forestry, trees have come down on top of lines and this has destroyed rural communities. We have to change the model to ensure infrastructure like that is protected. This needs to be done as quickly as possible. I wish the Minister and Ministers of State well. We hope to work co-operatively together. I certainly will be taking a strong stance for rural Ireland and to ensure people can get proper payment for the food they produce and proper payment from the schemes they enter. That is the responsibility of Government.”
“I recognise his commitment and that he hopes and expects to have a lot of this sorted out by June and that it will not happen in the future. For the vast majority of people, though, this has been the experience with every scheme that governments have continually brought out. This is not new. Every time a scheme is brought out, it is difficult, onerous and hard to comply with and slow to get paid. That is what happens with farmers every time. There is a big job of work to be done in the Department of agriculture to ensure there is a sea change in respect of all that. I mention the forestry sector, which has a huge impact in my part of the world, especially in respect of the storm which the Minister also mentioned.”
“Those people must have off-farm income, and therefore we have to ensure there is a vibrant economy in those rural areas alongside the agricultural economy so they have other opportunities. The sheep sector is very difficult also. We have to understand that for many people living on marginal land in poorer circumstances, where they do not have options, and although dairying is doing very well, that cannot be for everywhere, we have to recognise there should be better assistance in place for them. That is where the schemes come in, the ones Government has control over. I acknowledge the Minister's recognition of the frustration farmers have, particularly with ACRES and the significant problems that exist, which are far from resolved.”
“It is a massive part of our economy and we have to ensure we develop and grow our farming sector in particular. The Minister mentioned the various sectors. One of the problems with the Teagasc farm report is that it is about summary statistics, the overall picture. When we go down and bore into things a little bit, the report sometimes covers up some very disappointing situations, especially the suckling sector, which is one of the main sectors in my part of the country, where we have very low farm incomes. In the past couple of days I was just looking at this along with somebody else. A suckler farmer with 40 acres would find it hard to make a profit of €5,000 or €6,000 a year. If they were working on a building site, they would make in a month what they make in 12 months farming.”
“Many congratulations to the Leas-Cheann Comhairle on his position. I welcome the new Minister to his role also. I worked with the Minister, Deputy Heydon, in the previous Government and I hope to have a good and productive relationship with him in this one, and indeed with the Minister of State, Deputy Grealish. Much of what the Minister has said I cannot disagree with. We have a vibrant economic model in our farming sector. Both fisheries and farming have huge potential for our economy, particularly for rural areas. People living in coastal areas depend almost solely upon them and many of our small towns and villages would not operate if we did not have our farming communities. It is evident that Ireland is an agricultural country still.”
“That is why we must have firm regulation. That is why we have to ensure regulation is in place. Even the heroes of capitalism recognise the difficulty with it and the flaw in it, which is that the most powerful can use it for the negative and for their own benefit. That is why we have to ensure that artificial intelligence is used in a way that will be positive for people. That can only happen if Government, the people in these Houses, and particularly in the European Union - a lot of it will be governed from there - do so in a positive way to ensure we protect our citizens and enhance their lives rather than allow it to be used, as much of this technology has been used to date, for the negative. That is the point we need to focus on as we move forward in embracing this technology for the public good.”
“Vance had to say with regard to that when he went to the European convention recently in Munich. These are world players and they dominate, and that is the difficulty we have. One of the examples I often think about is Adam Smith. He wrote a book many years ago called The Wealth of Nations. He was, of course, the hero of capitalism, but he was also a very strong proponent for strong regulation, and that the strong hand of government had to be there to ensure there was fair play. Toward the end of that book there is a piece that states that never is there a time when two or more merchants come together for the most casual of conversation but the conversation turns to fix the market to their benefit.”
“It is down to that decision that has to be made. That is why regulation is so important in all of this. The opportunities that were spoken of by so many Deputies are absolutely real, including the opportunities in the health service, in education and even in our bus timetables. No matter what we look at, whether transport or whatever else, AI has a role to play that can be positive and enhancing for everyone in society. There are certainly opportunities in employment and so on. Possibly, in the future, it could create opportunities to create more new and different energy sources that will supply the energy which will be needed for it. In the end, it comes back to how we regulate this. There are very big vested interests ensuring that there is little or no regulation. We heard what Mr.”
“I congratulate the Minister of State on her new role. The opportunity to speak about artificial intelligence is apt at this point in time. At no age in our society has technology had a bigger role, particularly considering social media and the impact that has had on so many people across the globe, particularly across Ireland. It is clear that there is significant power in all of that. The previous speaker spoke of the power that AI has. The difficulty with it is that people have to make decisions as to how that power is employed. Will it be employed for the good or for the bad? We think of social media and the number of people whose lives have been destroyed by it because that power was used negatively, and the number of other people whose lives were enhanced by it because it was used positively.”
“I appreciate that the Minister said, although words are cheap and are very cheap in this place, she would do something about this and that she is committed to it. We bloody well need to see it because those families out there cannot go on like this for any longer. The children in this State deserve to get fair play. That is all they are asking for and not to have to get up every morning and battle and fight for what they are entitled to.”
“They get up in the morning and they have to fight to get an assessment of needs to find out what is wrong with their child and to get appropriate accommodation, whether it is in school, the HSE or whatever. Everything they do is a battle. It is battle after battle after battle. Is that the kind of State we should be proud of? I do not think so. After 14 years in government, that is the kind of State that has been created. The Government needs to cop on and recognise that we cannot go on the way we have. We have to recognise that these children are a reflection of the whole society we live in. If we cannot look after the weakest and most vulnerable in our society, then who can we look after?”
“I do not doubt her sincerity but I have to doubt her commitment. She and her colleagues have been 14 years in government. Most of these children were not born then, and she has been in government that long, yet we are in this diabolical situation. She has to step up to the mark and ensure that these places are provided. At the end of the day, families who have a child with special needs who needs special education have a huge burden to carry. We all know and understand that. The last thing they need is to have to fight for everything, yet that is their experience. Their experience of this State is that it is one where they have to fight every day of their life.”
“I commend Deputy O'Rourke on bringing forward this motion this evening. Like every other Deputy in this House, I have been inundated with people and families who face a terrible situation. They have children who need a special class or accommodation but cannot get it anywhere. Everywhere I go across the whole west of Ireland, Leitrim, Sligo and Donegal, I come across children who are travelling from one end of the country to the other. Children are going from County Cavan to County Leitrim and from County Leitrim to County Sligo. They are travelling 70 km or 80 km to get an appropriate school place. This criss-crossing throughout the country because they cannot anywhere near them is something that drives people mad. The Minister mentioned that she knows and has experience of these families. I am sure she has.”
“That needs to change, but we also need the Government to ensure people are adequately compensated and looked after in these circumstances. Many old people and people with disabilities were hugely stressed because of the situation-----”
“Any time power goes out for more than four or five days, every household should get a payment of €100 per day for every day the power is out. It would put a bit of a spark under them to ensure people were not without power for too long. Businesses should certainly be getting compensated. I spoke to a businessperson last week who has a small business in rural Ireland that sells pre-cast concrete. It has not been able to do anything for almost three weeks and it will probably be even longer before it can get back to work. Small businesses, including restaurants and hotels, have suffered greatly because of the mess that is in place, mainly because ESB Networks has not protected its critical infrastructure, that is, the lines that go through forests.”
“People have been told it will not pay for that. They have been told to contact their insurance. When they contact the insurance companies, some say they will cover it, but one woman told my office that the food would cost €800, but an additional €600 per year would go onto her insurance for the next three years because she would lose her no-claims bonus. Issues also arise due to the excess on insurance policies that businesses in particular have. Businesses are trying to claim insurance for the loss of goods and damage. They find there is an excess on their policies which they have to try to work with. We need some kind of scheme to be put in place to ensure people can be adequately compensated. ESB Networks should be the first to compensate people.”
“Thankfully, the vast majority of people have their power back now, but there has to be an emphasis on ensuring that there is a clear policy to protect those power lines and cut the trees back from them because when the next storm comes we will have the same problem again. That has to happen. The Government has to do that. There is no other way out of it. The other issue I will raise relates to the humanitarian assistance scheme. Hundreds of people who have put in forms have contacted my office. They have not received any money yet and do not know where they stand. It is ad hoc and a complete mess of a scheme. There needs to be a revamp of that scheme to ensure it does what it is supposed to do. When someone has a freezer full of food and the food has all gone to waste, the scheme should pay for it.”
“The Minister will be aware that we have a large volume of forestry in County Leitrim. We probably have the highest amount of forestry in the country per head of population or for the land area. That brought huge devastation when the power lines that go through the forests came down. The main issue we have is that the trees are planted too close to the lines. It is as simple as that. ESB Networks has the job of protecting critical infrastructure and it has not done so. That has been the key failure of this entire saga. We saw it in the last storm and again in this one. There are hundreds of trees on top of the lines and hundreds of trees on top of those trees. It takes days and in this case it has taken weeks to fix.”
“If this happened in any other part of the country, the Army and the Civil Defence would be out, everyone would be out, but they have not been sent to the west or the north west. I want to know why. Why is this Government letting down the people of my constituency and the parts of the country that have been worst affected by this storm? Why are they being left behind? The other important issue is that people are being charged standard charges for ESB and for power when they do not have any power. Are they going to continue to pay those charges? It is absolutely ridiculous.”