I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time." I am pleased to have the opportunity to present this long-awaited Bill to the House which will provide for the transposition of the EU whistleblowing directive into Irish law. This directive is among the most far-reaching and most significant pieces of legislation ever to be adopted by the EU. The benefits to society and democracy from protecting people of conscience who speak up about wrongdoing are clear if we reflect for a moment on the range of issues that woul…

The key test we are using is whether the workers were involved in the provision of healthcare. As the Deputy knows, we included, in respect of private employment, people working in nursing homes and hospices. The Department of Health is now drawing up the detailed guidelines. There will certainly be some people working with section 39 organisations who are directly involved in healthcare provision. We are looking in particular at the whole area of congregated settings because they are very similar in nature to nurs…

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. Home help workers, whether employed directly by the HSE or by a private provider but doing work on behalf of the HSE, will be included in the recognition payment.

The Deputies are speaking out of both sides of their mouths.

The Government acknowledges the contribution of our front-line healthcare workers and all workers across the economy during the Covid-19 pandemic. They have faced difficult challenges and have risen to the task. As a Government, we have on many occasions stated our commitment to recognise these efforts. There were a number of issues that had to be taken into consideration before we could finalise our proposals and the pandemic has remained an ongoing challenge for us all, requiring our full focus and attention. We …

The Government and I are enormously appreciative of the extraordinary work of the many thousands of carers throughout the country at all times and, in particular, over the course of the pandemic. As the Deputy will know, last year we increased the carer's support grant to €1,850. That was paid in June 2021. She will also know that in the budget, we made changes for the first time in a number of years in regard to the eligibility criteria for carer's allowance in relation to income and capital disregard. Those were …

The truth is that if the Government were to seek to meet all the legitimate calls that have been made to extend this pandemic payment, the cost of it would become very large. One could potentially be talking about €500 million or more. That is the truth if we were to include the full range of workers that have been suggested the Government include. Unfortunately, that is simply not possible. We would all love to extend this payment to a wide range of workers and volunteers without whom our experience of Covid would…

I thank the Deputy very much. The Haddington Road agreement provided for a range of significant reform and productivity measures including the introduction of the additional working hours for public servants the Deputy has referred to from 1 July 2013. She will be familiar with the details of those additional working hours. Chapter 4 of Building Momentum - A New Public Service Agreement 2021-2022 provides that the parties to the agreement recognise and accept that certain measures introduced under the public servic…

I thank the Deputy very much. It is fair to say that the Haddington Road hours have real value, especially in areas such as healthcare. These are hours in which really important work is carried out. There is a cost to replacing those hours. The work of assessing exactly what that cost will be is ongoing. My Department has, of course, carried out its own assessment over time but the independent body, which I hope will furnish its report to me in the coming weeks, has also looked at this issue and has received submis…

If we get to that point, and this matter is subject to a Government decision yet to be taken, because I must consider the report in the round and then bring a recommendation to Government, which I will do, and if changes are to be implemented, then it will be a matter for the individual sectors to determine how those changes are to be implemented. All sectors have been aware since late 2020 that this process of setting up an independent body to examine the Haddington Road agreement hours was being embarked upon. As…

Public service pay has been governed by a system of collective agreements since the Croke Park agreement was negotiated in 2010. These collective agreements have helped to ensure that public pay is managed in a sustainable, affordable and orderly manner. These agreements have also enabled significant reform of public services and changes to work practices. The current public service agreement is Building Momentum - A New Public Service Agreement 2021-2022. It is weighted towards those on lower incomes, with headlin…

On the pandemic recognition payment, I hear what the Deputy has to say. We discussed this earlier. The challenge for the Government is this. The Deputy mentioned retail workers. There are up to 300,000 retail workers in Ireland. There are about 120,000 carers in receipt of the carer's support grant. The Deputy can do the maths. If we add that to the cost of what the Government has committed to, we are getting to north of half a billion euro very quickly. That is the reality that the Government has to face in making…

I have acknowledged that the price pressures are impacting on people negatively. It is not just energy prices although the headline inflation rate has been driven up substantially by energy prices. We are also seeing it coming through in rising food prices in our supermarkets. Of course that is a concern. However, we have to look at what the Government is doing in the round. I spoke about the public sector pay improvements. We are seeing wage improvements across the private sector as well. When we add to that what …

Information on expenditure is published each month in the Fiscal Monitor, with the provisional end-December 2021 gross capital expenditure position recorded as €9.9 billion. A breakdown of both current and capital expenditure for each Department is set out on pages 19 and 20 of the Fiscal Monitor, published on 5 January this year. The provisional data in the Fiscal Monitor indicate an increase in gross capital expenditure of just under €300 million or 3% above the expenditure level recorded in 2020. However, when a…

The outturn that we achieved in 2021 represented a strong performance, particularly in light of the fact that non-essential construction was closed for so long. My overall message is that, with a record budget of €12 billion in 2022, I want to see that money spent on new schools, our hospitals, climate action measures, public transport projects, road projects and so on. Working with the Minister of State, Deputy Ossian Smyth, we have introduced changes in the area of procurement that recognise the reality of the ex…

In my time in the Department, I have introduced new reporting requirements whereby the Departments with the largest capital budgets report directly to the Cabinet on their outturn from capital expenditure. It is an issue that I review regularly. I have emphasised the importance of and need to implement the public capital programme. This is money that we want to see spent. I will be monitoring the issue closely over the course of this year. If we see a scenario where significant underspends emerge in one area and we…

The EU's recovery and resilience facility will make some €724 billion available to member states in the form of grants and loans to help repair the economic and social damage brought about by the pandemic and to make post-Covid European economies and societies more sustainable, resilient and better prepared for the challenges and opportunities of the green and digital transitions. Ireland will receive almost €1 billion in grants over the lifetime of the facility. In order to access this funding, the Government deve…

As the Deputy has indicated, we have 16 investment projects and nine reform measures. While my Department has the implementing body and the delivering committee which will monitor the implementation of the plan and will be responsible for all of the contact with the EU bodies, responsibility for implementing the individual measures will lie with the relevant Departments and bodies. Looking across the range of projects, both the investment and the reform projects, many of them are very much live projects that are cu…

There is a lot to get through in a minute. First, in relation to SMEs, we very deliberately made the decision that under both the green transition and digital transformation, there would be an opportunity for grants to be made available to the enterprise sector to assist them in that transition. Those grants will be brought forward over the course of the national resilience and recovery plan. In relation to the shared Government data centre, the site has been identified. It is an important project to build a State …

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta. Cuirim fáilte roimh achtú Acht na dTeangacha Oifigiúla (Leasú), 2021. Is nóiméad tábhachtach é seo do lucht na Gaeltachta, do na daoine a labhraíonn Gaeilge agus dóibh siúd a bhfuil suim acu sa teanga. Tagann sé i ndiaidh tréimhse fhada chomhairliúcháin agus dhíospóireachta. Feabhsóidh an tAcht seo na forálacha do chainteoirí Gaeilge. I welcome the enactment of the Official Languages (Amendment) Act 2021 on 22 December. It underpins a key programme for Government commitment. It is …