When the contract was signed, was it understood that the €175 million equity investment could be by way of debt? What exactly are we talking about in respect of the guarantee? There is information available on the fees paid in 2020 but, in his review, did the Minister come up with figures for 2021? What is the current interest bill? What is the position on the high-cost loans, in particular? At this point in time, we understand the figure is about 11.8%, but we want to know where we are. David McCourt spoke about s…

I accept the Minister of State is not going to have all the answers but, on that basis, I believe we are going to have to have some sort of forum in which we can have a proper over-and-back discussion. We have all been very frightened about the ability of National Broadband Ireland to deliver on the national broadband plan. I will ask a few more questions for the record but I would like the Minister of State to deal with the issue of delivery and state whether the target of passing 60,000 premises will be reached b…

I will not repeat myself completely but I ask the question again about the €175 million equity investment and whether it could be achieved by way of debt. Was that understood from the very beginning? Will the Minister of State go into some detail on what seems to be the early release of the performance bond? On the question of premises passed, the Minister of State has indicated the figure will be 35,000 by the end of December but are we talking about 50,000 or 60,000 by the end of January? Will he give an exact ti…

In fairness, the Minister of State has already agreed we need another forum and there was discussion on this earlier. We are possibly talking about a Topical Issues matter. I request publication of the results of the review to whatever degree it can be done. At least we can have the information in front of us before we have the wider discussion. I will go back to get the detail correct in my head. The 35,000 premises are to be passed by the end of the year. When will the 50,000 or 60,000 premises be passed? We need…

The figure I am going to need is what we think is going to be passed by the end of January. We had it in our heads that it would be 60,000 and the big worry is we are also meant to get in that year that there would be catch-up on Covid-19 delays. We are expecting a plan for that around March, although we accept it will not kick in until 2023 and beyond. We also expected the seven-year programme to be accelerated into a five-year programme, with all this laid out contractually in and around March. The fact we will n…

I agree with a great deal of what has been said. We are dealing with the final report of the seafood task force. It lays out starkly the position of the fishing industry and the communities that lie behind it. We have had many reports on many issues over many years but we have not necessarily done anything other than bind them and present them well. We have not always done the business or carried out the required due diligence. There are fishing communities across this island, including in Clogherhead and other are…

I accept what the Minister of State said that this is a technical necessity and just a continuation of the status quo. We all accept that it makes absolute sense that passenger name records information is maintained for a certain period. We all know that we need all the tools that are required to deal with international crime, which is utterly cross-border and, in some cases, technically more proficient than traditional states or even the likes of the European Union. We have to get ourselves into the game. It hardl…

We are all dealing with a situation where a large number of people engage private health insurance. It amounts to 45% of people in the State. On some level, this Bill, which is a process that we go through every year, is an element of accepting the failure of our system, in that we do not have the public health system that people deserve and require. We all accept the necessity of this legislation and that, through risk equalisation, we insert an element of fairness into a system that is unfair across the board. Th…

I am looking for detail on the mobile phone and broadband task force, which the Minister mentioned earlier. I want to know about its membership and structure, what specific actions are intended for it to take and any initial engagements that are due to take place. We all know the difficulties there are at this point in time with the roll-out of the national broadband plan, NBP. Even in a best-case scenario, we know provision in a number of areas is going to be very late to be delivered upon and we need to look at i…

I really welcome the news that the task force will meet next week, which is vital. We can guess the different actions it will need to do. If it sets out with a limited scope in terms of the number of jobs it has to do and if it can deliver on them, that will be welcome. A vital part of that will be dealing with interim solutions for areas that may be waiting five, six or seven years at this point for delivery of the national broadband roll-out. It is very difficult to talk about National Broadband Ireland, NBI, wit…

Planning and licensing will be major issues, and they obviously need to be done. Significant work has been done by broadband officers. I will come at this from two ends. There is a necessity to look at planning laws and such. National Broadband Ireland, NBI, is looking for the resource to be available, particularly if it gets to the point of an acceleration, where people would have the knowledge of planning permissions and road opening licences. Those would be road engineers and those with knowledge of planning, an…

We are here to discuss the planned removal of the community and voluntary addiction network groups from the national oversight committee on the delivery of the national drugs strategy. We believed the removal was going to happen on Friday. A number of us met and the Minister of State will have received a letter as well as communications from a number of people on this matter. There has been a stay of execution and there is talk of further discussion, which needs to happen. I am seeking real engagement. The concern …

It is fair to say that communities have been failed over the years. This is where we are starting from. When we talk to any organisation working in the community and voluntary sector that deals with drug addiction and the communities that are being ravaged by it, they tell us that it has become more difficult to deal with the State. I hope that what the Minister of State is saying will be the case, that there will be no diminution in the number of groups sitting on the national oversight committee and that the dete…

There should be no diminution in numbers.

I agree with all that has been said. Whether it is through the Minister’s Department or whatever, we need an audit of buildings that are lying idle in order to determine which of them can be used better. We need also to build in the wider question of those youth supports and an audit of those projects and services that operate and where the gaps are. I have said previously to the Minister that we need to deal with those absolutely necessary family supports. That is a vital matter. At times really good projects have…

I have had a number of engagements, both public and private, with the Minister of State on this issue. All of us in this House understand the difficulties that exist regarding families who are looking for home care packages that will ensure their family members can stay at home as opposed to needing to go into long-term nursing care. We need to deliver that, while accepting there are difficulties because of pay scales and other issues. The Minister of State's task force has met a couple of times and is considering …

I appreciate that. I accept the added difficulties with the pilots the Department was looking to put in place in the context of the wider issue we have that an insufficient number of people are working in this sector. I know that a lot of things are being considered. We have to look at pay scales and any incentivisation we can provide. We know of the difficulties of people, some of whom were contracted staff, who would state that they were not going to get paid expenses for travel. Every obstacle possible was being…

Obviously, we need to look at the issue of the rates of pay. Again, I accept the difficulties in providing a timeline, but we need that task force to have its inaugural meeting. I accept that considerable work has probably been done, but we need the task force to put the priorities that are required in place and on the agenda, to be enacted by the Government as quickly as possible. We are all dealing with families coming to us who just do not have sufficient care. Could the Minister of State detail, as I said, the …

That would be brilliant.

They are family-friendly.