Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 17 Oct 2024

The serial waste of the public's money on the watch of the Government is absolutely astonishing. The catalogue of waste is well rehearsed. A sum of €336,000 was spent on a bicycle shelter and the Government cannot even tell us who signed off on it yet. There was €1.4 million on a security hut. There was a doubling of the cost of modular homes for Ukrainians to a jaw-dropping €442,000 each, despite being initially costed at €200,000 per unit. Some €9 million is being spent on phone pouches, something the Government has dressed up as a mental health measure for school students, while schools are crying out for services. It is a move most people think is absolutely ludicrous, while it seems the only people who do not think that are those within the Fianna Fáil Parliamentary Party.

Do not even get me started on the most expensive hospital in the world. The debacle surrounding the massive, mind-boggling cost overruns and the never-ending delays at the national children's hospital is a tale of incompetence for the history books. The Government finds it so incredibly easy to squander taxpayers' hard-earned money and it seems there is just no end to it. This morning, the people of Ireland got to read yet another chapter in the Government's sorry story of waste. We learned in the Irish Medical Times that a further six HSE construction projects have run over budget to the grand tune of €17 million. Each of these projects was initially costed at €10 million and every single one of them has run over the originally approved price. The Government's waste of public money has gone on a roadshow all over the country. The first stop is in the Tánaiste's home city of Cork, where a community nursing unit is over budget by nearly €6 million. The next stop is in my home city of Galway where a radiation oncology building is over budget by €4.16 million. Back in Cork, a ward block at the Mercy hospital is over budget by €2.72 million, and back in County Galway, in Tuam, a residential care unit is over budget by €2.38 million. In Dublin, a critical care unit at Tallaght hospital is €2.23 million over budget and the final stop is in Kilkenny where a ward block in St. Luke's hospital is nearly €500,000 over budget.

I know that all these projects are extremely important for the people. These projects are badly needed to serve the communities in those areas and God knows we need the health infrastructure badly after decades of bad policies and bad decisions by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. It should not be beyond us, however, to deliver what our people need and to deliver it on budget, using the public's money wisely, but it seems at this stage the Government is just incapable of doing that, so the waste just goes on and on. I know that the Tánaiste is going to cite inflation in the construction sector, but the overrun on the nursing unit in Cork was a staggering 25% and that is just not where inflation in the construction sector is. The sum €17 million is a massive amount when it comes to health. We were here just yesterday talking about a special needs school in Dublin facing closure for the sake of €125,000 a year and the parents from that school had to go onto national TV to plead for help. In the budget, the Government gave only €2.9 million for youth mental health services, which are on the floor. This has a very big impact and real-life consequences for people. We now see this waste right across the board. Waste and incompetence in the use of public money is the hallmark of the Government and it has to stop.

Does the Tánaiste accept that this runaway train of waste of the public's money on the watch of his Government is unacceptable? What is he going to do to stop it? Will he tell the Dáil whether any other public projects have gone over budget?

I welcome the pupils from St. Columba's National School in Cork. I hope to meet them after this session.

Ní aontaím leis an Teachta. Bíonn suas le €14 billiún á chaitheamh ag an Rialtas gach aon bhliain anois. Tá an-chuid foirgneamh scoile, tograí sláinte agus tithíochta curtha i bhfeidhm ar fud na tíre. I do not agree with the Deputy's overall narrative in respect of what has been probably the most extensive building of schools, primary care centres, hospital facilities and public facilities across the country. We have provided thousands of beds in our healthcare sector since the Government was formed, the vast majority on time and within budget, and the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Dún Laoghaire is a very good example of that.

We have had the largest schools building programme in a generation over the past four years, and the Deputy did not reference all the schools that came in on budget and on time, with exceptional standards of quality now. I recently opened an Educate Together school in Douglas, Cork, and I invite her to visit that school to see the standard, the spec and the quality of provision. Scoil Mhuire Gan Smal in Blarney is another example. It is a new post-primary school with accommodation for 1,000 pupils, including four new classrooms for special education, at a total estimate of €31 million. The Deputy spoke about Limerick. The Educate Together there is a new 1,000 post-primary school, completed for €35 million. The extension of St. Conleth and Mary’s Primary School in Newbridge, comprising 18 new classrooms and four classrooms for children with special educational needs, was completed with an investment of €24 million. The Central Mental Hospital in Portrane was also completed on time and on budget.

The Deputy might be interested to hear that yesterday, I visited Shanganagh. I dug the site at Shanganagh two years ago. It is a Land Development Agency project. Close to 600 houses are now complete on time and within budget. I know that Sinn Féin wants to get rid of the Land Development Agency, change it and so on, even though it has 14,000 houses planned to 2028. Sinn Féin's proposals for more delay and disruption and for changing the remit are what give rise-----

-----to increased expenditure and so on.

There has been inflation, coming out of the war in Ukraine. We all know that. Everybody knows there was a period coming out of the start of that war and coming after Covid where the cost of building materials, in particular, went through the roof. We know that from some of the road projects. Some of those road projects we approved, where the final bill was higher than what was estimated, were road projects for which Deputies from Sinn Féin and, indeed, other parties had lobbied extensively, irrespective of the price. Sinn Féin's attitude in here to certain road projects-----

-----which were being evaluated was such that its Deputies in here said they wanted the project to get done and asked why we were delaying it. The Dunkettle interchange is an example. It is an exceptional piece of work from an engineering perspective on the way into the Jack Lynch Tunnel, but I recall that when we went back to tender to get better value for money compared with the original tender, the cry in the House from the Opposition, including from Sinn Féin Deputies, was that we were delaying it deliberately and they asked us to please get on with it.

As the Deputy well knows, there is the Comptroller and Auditor General. I acknowledge the criticism of the bike shed and do not defend it at all. It should not have happened, in my view. That is why we have the C and AG.

We are spending about €14 billion per annum now in capital infrastructure works and, yes, we do need rigorous, vigilant examination of public expenditure through the public accounts committee and the reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General to keep the broader system to heel.

Thosaigh an Tánaiste agus léirigh sé na tograí a tháinig isteach ar an bpraghas gur chóir dóibh teacht isteach. Is é sin an jab atá ag an Rialtas. Shílfeá go mbeadh a fhios ag an Tánaiste gur chóir d'aon togra teacht isteach ar an bpraghas gur chóir dó. The Tánaiste started off talking to me about the projects that have come in on budget. One would hope the Government would be trying to bring things in on budget. The reality here though is that it is not. There are so many examples of huge cost overruns consistently under this Government. Just to be very clear here: this is not just me saying it. The Government's own HSE audit and risk committee has identified this. When the Government uses contractors, it is supposed to share the risk. What is clear here that it is the public purse, the taxpayers' money, that is always the one that takes the risk on board. The Tánaiste did not answer me. Is it unacceptable that there are consistently these overruns? He did not mention who signed off on the bike shelter, and he certainly did not identify what other projects went over the cost they are supposed to go over. That is unacceptable. The Tánaiste should see that as unacceptable and he should outline that to this Dáil.

We are fundamentally committed to value for money. The Comptroller and Auditor General is there; the public accounts committee is there. This is part of our system of rigorously examining public expenditure. My point, in response to the Deputy's presentation, is the lack of balance in her presentation and the lack of any reference to some very significant projects that have been delivered. More than 330 school building projects were delivered in 2023 under the large scale and additional accommodation programmes. Under National Development Plan 2018-2023, we are looking at 1,200 school building projects completed. It is an enormous amount of construction-----

I have run out of words to describe the horror unfolding in Gaza and now in Lebanon. This week, I and millions of other people, watched a young man in a hospital tent burn alive. He was still attached to an IV drip and was reaching out his hand for help. The Israeli army had targeted a missile strike on tents in the grounds of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. Not content with destroying all the hospitals in Gaza, it is now bombing the ruins. The name of the man who died was Shaban al-Dalou. He was 19 years old and a computer engineer student. Shaban was sheltering in a tent on the hospital grounds with his parents and his five siblings. He had been there for some time. In February, in a social media video, he said his family had been displaced five times. He had been trying to leave Gaza and reach safety. On his GoFundMe page he wrote:

I used to have big dreams, but the war has ruined them ... Time feels like it's stopped in Gaza, and we're stuck in a never-ending nightmare.

Shaban is one of more than 40,000 people in Gaza who have been slaughtered. His mother also burned alive. I name him here today because we do not hear the names or see the faces of the victims in Gaza. Every single one of those more than 40,000 people had a life, a family and hopes and dreams, but they have been massacred in a glorified prison camp for more than 12 months while the world sits idly by. Journalists in Gaza who have been documenting this genocide have been targeted and killed too, to stop them broadcasting Israel's war crimes to the world. How can we watch this massacre every single day and not do more? The Israeli state has lost any pretence of morality or proportionality. It is a rogue state, which is attempting to plunge the whole region into war. This Government, which talks tough on Israel, has yet to apply any actual sanctions. Our economic diplomatic and travel relationship with Israel is virtually unchanged. We now learn the Government is finally going to move on the occupied territories Bill because the legal advice is that the International Court of Justice, ICJ, ruling in the summer has changed things. Illegal Israeli settlements were a breach of international law when the occupied territories Bill was drafted in 2018. The genocide unfolding in Gaza was a breach of international law last year. We did not need the ICJ ruling to act. The ruling just means the Government has run out of excuses for inaction. With an election imminent, the Government has almost run out of time to do anything. Everyone in this House will co-operate to get the occupied territories Bill enacted. It seems like the election will be in a matter of weeks. What is being done to get this over the line before then?

What is happening in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon is absolutely unacceptable. It is clearly in breach of international humanitarian law. In terms of what happened in northern Gaza in the last week, we witnessed war crimes of a shocking nature taking place. I immediately called that out in a statement in respect of what was happening in northern Gaza and followed that up at the Foreign Affairs Council on Monday this week. I really had to say to some of my colleagues around the table there that the European Union needed to do far more in respect of the horrific murder, slaughter that is going on in Gaza, and the collective punishment of an entire people.

I disagree with the Deputy saying this Government has not done anything. I do not like that rhetoric, that sort of partisanship in this debate or the almost holier-than-thou attitude from the Opposition vis-à-vis the Government. There is a collective view in this House on what should happen here. There should be an immediate ceasefire. There should be a release of all hostages. The holding of hostages for a full year by Hamas for a full year is equally heinous and should not be tolerated. There should also be an immediate surge of humanitarian aid. Ireland was one of the first countries to defend UNRWA, which is the most practical thing we can do for the people of Gaza and the West Bank and the Palestinians in Jordan and Lebanon. Despite all the rhetoric and "do this, do that", the most significant thing we have done in this was to stand up and stop the undermining of UNRWA and say to our European Union colleagues not to pull funding from UNRWA. We helped to reverse that policy position, which one Commissioner was advocating when he had pulled funds from UNRWA. Philippe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, acknowledges that. That is one thing. We were also one of the few member states, along with Spain, to recognise the State of Palestine. Everybody in this House wanted that. As soon as we did it, of course, everybody in the House said we were doing nothing, that is done; move on. The reality is that this created its own issues but it was the right thing to do as part of the Arab peace plan. Everything we have been doing has been working with Arab nations that want peace, namely, Jordan, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Palestine itself. Talking to the members of the Palestinian Authority, they do not speak about the Irish Government like the Deputy does. They genuinely do not. They say Ireland is giving very strong leadership.

On the question of the occupied territories Bill, the ICJ's opinion does matter and does change the circumstances. I can elaborate on that with the Deputy is she wishes. I have no issue in talking to her and to other party leaders in respect of this. For far too long, we have too much simplistic narrative about the Middle East and we need to be very clear in how we progress this, making sure we can do it in an effective way, both politically and legally.

However, because the Government waited, we are now running out of time. I heard the Tánaiste on The Irish Times podcast say that we would have an election after critical pieces of legislation were passed. Does that mean there is an army of lawyers in the Attorney General's office and the Department of Finance working morning, noon and night to try to get the occupied territories Bill over the line? The Tánaiste said it needs amendments. Are they being drafted as we speak? Is this hugely legislation being prioritised or are we just going to get more words?

There are other things that we can do. At a bare minimum, we can stop the passage of weapons through Irish airspace. This is an issue that was first raised by The Ditch months ago. Last night, the Minister of State, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, said on "The Tonight Show" that the Government is still not sure if any weapons were on board those flights. I do not know if she was serious. If The Ditch can find out, I do not know why the Government cannot. Months ago, the Tánaiste said he would introduce travel bans for violent Israeli settlers. Even the United States, Israel's biggest cheerleader, has managed to do that. The Tánaiste talks a lot about what he said and he says that he stood up and said “No”. What has he done and what actions and sanctions have there been?

There are aspects of the occupied territories Bill that are clearly unconstitutional but they can be rectified and amended. It is clearly unconstitutional as it is currently drafted. There was a case just ten days ago concerning France v. the European Commission in respect of Western Sahara. There are very clear similarities between that and the West Bank. The ruling on that was not as favourable as we would have liked given what we want to do in ensuring we can prohibit trade to the Occupied Territories. That is the target and the objective.

I believe the ICJ gives us a pathway that we did not have because trade is still an exclusive competence of the European Commission; that is a fact. However, there is a public policy exemption that one could invoke. In our view, the ICJ perhaps gives us the potential to invoke that narrow pathway to doing what everyone in the House agrees on, namely, not having trade with the occupied territories. The ICJ ruling, while not binding on all states, is an authoritative statement of international humanitarian law. We cosponsored the resolution that led to the ICJ doing this. We made a written submission to it and the Attorney General made an oral submission to the ICJ on this issue, much of which was reflected in the subsequent judgment that the occupation was illegal and that states now had an obligation not to do anything that would support the occupation. It is very significant in charting and enabling us to navigate a way forward on this question.

I wish to raise the issue of the Government's carbon tax mismanagement. Billions of euro have been collected and millions of euro wasted. The C and AG report, which the Tánaiste drew on just minutes ago, reveals that 39% of carbon tax funds are misallocated. I am very concerned about the Government's handling of carbon tax funds and the allocation of the €2.872 billion collected from 2020 to 2023. Of the €1.36 billion allocated from the increases in the tax between 2020 and 2023, a staggering 39%, amounting to €530 million, remains unaccounted for in the target areas. This glaring shortfall is a clear indication that the Government is not only failing to deliver on its promises to improve home efficiency and spend carbon tax funds in a manner that enhances renewable energy and the environment, but it is also misleading the public about the true use of these funds. Where has the rest of the money gone? This is not chicken feed; this is €530 million.

This mismanagement is not just about financial oversight; this represents a profound breach of public trust and a reckless disregard for the urgent need to address climate change effectively. The people of Ireland deserve transparency and accountability, not empty promises and squandered resources. The Government has legislated for the carbon tax to increase incrementally each year until it reaches €100 per tonne by 2030, which will continue to drive up the cost of living for everyone. Last week, Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and the Green Party increased the price of petrol and diesel as the tax reached €63.50 per tonne. I must also point to the rapid increase in carbon tax receipts, which have nearly doubled from €494 million in 2020 to €935 million in 2023. Well over €1 billion will be collected this year but the Government has neither a strategy or a plan to effectively use these funds in a meaningful way that supports key sectors, such as farmers or homeowners. Instead, these funds are being used to prop up a dysfunctional system. That is a fact. As I said, this is not chicken feed. It is massive money. It is a con job.

The Economic and Social Research Institute, which the Tánaiste always quotes, projects a potential contraction of real GDP by 1.4% by 2030 due to these tax increases, along with higher energy costs affecting all householders. This is why the Rural Independent Group has consistently campaigned against this unfair and costly tax. Will the Tánaiste explain where the €530 million has gone? It was supposed to be spent. Every time we ask a question in the House or table a written question, we get the same answer, namely, it has been spent on retrofitting. People are waiting two years to get a visit from the SEAI to upgrade their homes. This is the greatest con and the Government has been found out. These are not my figures but the figures that have been provided. The €530 million that has been taken from the people has not been given back.

I do not accept that. The carbon tax commenced with this Government. We legislated for it to provide funds to help us reduce carbon emissions and transform certain sectors of our economy, one of the key aspects being retrofitting and creating more energy-efficient homes. The carbon tax has ensured that €262 million-----

The Government allocated €380 million to retrofitting this year, more than half of which is dedicated to providing 100% free retrofitting to low-income households and those at risk of energy poverty. Anybody in the country would have to acknowledge that the retrofitting programme has been a transformation in the past four years. If we did not have the carbon tax, we could not do that and we would not have developed an industry around retrofitting. The industry knows that for the next decade, funds will be available to retrofit homes and buildings to make sure we are more energy efficient.

On the lower-income and social protection side, it was recommended that we would guard against fuel poverty for people on welfare and on the lowest incomes. Some €262 million has been allocated to other targeted social protection payments this year. Approximately 400,000 low-income households have benefited from our significantly expanded and increased fuel allowance schemes in past winters. My understanding of the report referred to by the Deputy is that its authors felt the breakdown on social protection was not as precise as they would have liked. Nonetheless, there is no doubt that significant funding has been allocated to the fuel poverty area.

Farming is an area close to the Deputy’s heart. This is helping our farmers and farm families directly. In 2024, €113 million in carbon tax funding has been allocated to agri-environmental schemes specifically. In the time ahead, we need to do more for farmers. We need to give further and increased funding to farmers to deal with the issues and challenges they have in respect of the climate change agenda, but also in terms of biodiversity and nature restoration, so there is sufficient incentivisation and revenue streams for the farming community to enable them to address the issues they face. Many in the agriculture industry have engaged more than those in other sectors on this issue. They tend to bring a more detailed approach to the issues at farm level, which has been my experience when I engage with farmers.

There are three pillars to it: the fuel poverty pillar, the retrofitting and energy-efficiency pillar and the agri-environmental pillar. That is where the funding is going from the carbon tax.

I asked a question about the €530 million that is missing. That is according to C and AG report, not my report. The Tánaiste quotes the C and AG when he wants to. Deputy Farrell asked questions that had not been answered.

I asked a question about the €530 million in carbon tax that has been robbed from the people and that was supposed to go back into retrofitting and the Tánaiste went from this pillar to that pillar to the other pillar. It is a case of around the houses and mind the dresser but he will not answer the question. He goes canvassing every day and gets questions he cannot answer. He can only waffle. This is fact. This is from the Comptroller and Auditor General. Do we give up altogether if we do not accept his reports? We are talking about €530 million out of the €1.36 billion collected from people who are trying to survive, carry out their business and travel to work and the Tánaiste tells us all about what is spent here and there. I asked a question about the €530 million that is missing. Tá sé imithe - like snow off a ditch. It does not matter to the Government anymore. The bike shed is chickenfeed according to this. There is €530 million unaccounted for according to the Comptroller and Auditor General. These are not Mattie McGrath's words so spin your way out of that.

In what may well be my last Leaders' Questions in the Dáil, I return to familiar territory, an issue I have raised with the Tánaiste and others many times, namely, the delivery of balanced regional development. I understand that the delivery of a balance of development between regions is not something that can be accomplished overnight, particularly when there are significant gaps. It has to be embedded in all Departments and overseen by a senior Minister with responsibility for co-ordination and delivery. Unfortunately, that has not happened.

The reason I can say this with certainty is that the economic gap between the northern and western region and other regions continues to widen and, very unfortunately, the gap also continues to widen between it and regions across the EU. If any policy is working, we will see at least some impact. That impact has to be visible in some areas of the economy. I will give a few examples to illustrate the failure of current policy with regard to balanced regional development. All the figures produced by the Northern and Western Regional Assembly and Eurostat show that the northern and western region is poorly served in terms of national resources. The most recent figures show that since 2016, just 11% of all national projects worth over €1 million were committed to this region even though we have 17% of the population. Shamefully, only 5.7% of all national projects worth over €20 million were committed to this region. Again, this region has 17% of the population. If we look at housing completions last year, a region with 17% of the population had 11% of housing completions. Look at national and local roads. Our local roads budget for the past ten years has been well below the national average and the national roads budget was one third less than the national average.

Those figures are staggering and they are also accurate. Why has the Government not moved decisively to close that economic gap? What is it proposing to do in the future that is different and will make a real change because balanced regional development is not happening?

Hear me out, please. I was in a rural village recently during the local elections. A councillor pointed out to me that the population had gone from about 500 when he went into local government to 2,500 or 3,000, the point being that the place had grown. A lot of rural Ireland has grown in population yet the mantra is a declining rural Ireland. It has elected a lot of Independents to this House.

Somehow the truth is not reconciling here because there has been huge development in many parts of the regions. Equally, there have been big investments in Dublin and other urban areas. Post-Covid, it will be very interesting to see what happens because of the development of remote working, rural working hubs and so on. We are now getting a greater concentration of workers outside cities than ever before, which is adding to rural economies and local economies. Very large infrastructural investments are happening in terms of road developments and third level institutions. Far more needs to happen with public transport but there is a longer lead-in time in terms of rail projects. We have had the all-island rail review but there is a longer lead-in time in terms of that.

We need clarity on roads and the next Government and the next programme for Government should be very clear on roads in terms of what we want to get done and get it done. That is an issue, although an awful lot has been done. The inflation we spoke about earlier has driven road projects excessively over budget. It is simply because of building materials post-Covid and the energy crisis following Ukraine, which we stabilised.

Over €175 million was spent on the Atlantic Technological University in 2023. Good capital projects are happening there. Under call 3 of the urban regeneration and development fund, €20 million has been allocated to the north west. The Ballaghaderreen to Scramoge road is a huge project. It is significantly over budget before anyone starts roaring, or not roaring but complaining, about it yet everybody wants it. We approved it even though we knew it has gone significantly over what was originally envisaged. The Westport to Turlough road opened in June 2023. Ireland West Airport has been designated as a strategic development zone. We went against all the economists 30 or more years ago when Knock Airport was established so efforts have always been made to go against the grain in respect of investment in the regions. I am committed to investment in the regions and the cities and towns in the regions.

This always happens. The Tánaiste lists a few projects. Of course, I do not dispute that they are happening but he ignores the overall abysmal picture. He ignores the facts and does not deal with them. He does not come back to me and say "Well, Deputy Harkin, actually you are wrong about the completions in housing, wrong about the fact that we do not spend a reasonable amount in the northern and western region and wrong about all the facts that you put before me." The Tánaiste does not do any of that. He talks about a project here and a project there. Of course, he is right but that is the problem. The problem is the mindset that thinks that if the Government can give a bit here and a bit there, that is balanced regional development. It is not. I will give an example.

For example, a half hour ago, I spoke to the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, about the strategic rail review. I spoke about the Dublin-Sligo rail line. He talked about the new projects and mentioned balanced regional development twice. He said there were projects in Cork, Galway, Waterford and Limerick, as well as Dublin. That is the mindset I am speaking about. Until that changes, I or somebody else will be making this argument week after week and month after month in this House and we will not be making progress.

We need to engage on this too. More than 500,000 jobs have been created since this Government took office. Some 75% of those new jobs were created outside Dublin. The mantra for years was that it was all Dublin-based, IDA-created jobs. That is not the case any more. The Government has mandated the IDA to look to secure at least 50% of all new jobs outside of Dublin. Approximately 1,800 IDA-client companies are directly employing more than 300,000 people in Ireland for the second consecutive year. More than half of these are outside Dublin, which demonstrates the scale of the contribution of foreign direct investment to Ireland. The whole agenda and policy is to regionalise that FDI footprint throughout the country and provide more jobs in rural and regional Ireland in terms of IDA activity. Investment in the west and Border regions has been consistent over the past five years. Again, employment in counties Donegal, Sligo, Mayo, Leitrim, Roscommon and Galway increased by 18% between 2018 and 2022.

No, they do not lie. Jobs are up by 18%. The 3,000 beds provided by the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, and the Department of Health are regionally proofed. They are across the entire region. All our training for nurses, due to decisions I took as far back as 2003, is regionalised. We gave the institutes the technology the capacity to train for nursing therapies way back. That is the way to do it.