Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 13 Feb 2025

Vol. 1062 No. 8

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Is fíor a rá gur chaith Rialtais Fhianna Fáil agus Fhine Gael go holc le ceantair tuaithe ar fud an Stáit thar na blianta. Léiríonn an dóigh ar láimhseáil an Rialtas an stoirm is déanaí an cás seo arís. Le rudaí a dhéanamh níos measa, tá na bodaigh mhóra i mBord Soláthair an Leictreachais anois ag rá go gcaithfidh gnáthdhaoine na tíre seo, daoine a bhí fágtha gan leictreachas, billí níos airde a íoc chun an damáiste a chóiriú. Caithfear stop a chur leis seo. It is fair to say that both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments have successively given a raw deal to rural Ireland throughout the years. At times, rural communities have been treated as almost second-class citizens. With the formation of their most recent Government, we see that the sidelining of rural Ireland and the west continues, with just one Minister from all of Connacht and Ulster and no Minister from the Border counties at all. Well done. The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have together managed to pull off perhaps the most east-coast-centric Government ever.

While rural people are well used to getting the cold shoulder from the Government, we have seen this disrespect and marginalisation in its sharpest, most disastrous form in the aftermath of the most recent storm. The Government's sluggish and shoddy response to the devastation and hardship caused by the storm in rural Ireland says it all. Its failure to treat it as a national crisis meant communities were left with significant difficulties just to meet basic needs. That was to be seen right across rural Ireland. Many experienced real isolation in the absence of power, water, light, heat and telecommunications. Apart from the heroic efforts of ordinary workers, community activists and those in our local authorities and utility companies, the reality is that most communities had to fend for themselves as the Government failed to grasp the severity of the situation.

The reason we see this slack response from the Government is because rural communities and those who live there simply do not matter in the eyes of this Government. That sense of abandonment and anger is very real. To add insult to injury, we now have the top brass of the ESB effectively bullying those who suffered the most. It beggars belief that the CEO of the ESB came out and said that its customers would have to foot the bill for damage to the network caused by the storm. This is the head of a company which made profits of €898 million in 2023 telling people in rural Ireland, many of whom went without electricity for two weeks, that they have to cough up in the form of higher bills. What planet is he living on? Let me be clear, it is the ESB who should be compensating customers for the amount of time they went without power. To fund the repair of the network, the CEO's first port of call needs to be the massive profits the ESB has accumulated through ripping off customers with some of the highest electricity prices in the EU in recent years.

People are really angry about this. The top brass of the ESB need a wake-up call and the people are asking why the Government is not giving it to them. Clearly, the head honchos of the ESB are not prepared to let a good crisis go to waste in boosting profits. The Government needs to come off the bench in this. The Tánaiste needs to get on the pitch to start protecting people from the impact of this storm and to ensure the storm is not used as an excuse by the ESB to gouge customers even further. What does that mean? It means hauling in the senior management of the ESB, sitting them down and making it very clear to them that those whose lives have been rocked by this storm are not the people who are going to be forced to fork out in order to cover up the failures and mismanagement of the ESB in the first instance. Indeed, the ESB should be compensating those customers who were left without electricity, many for up to two weeks.

The Tánaiste

I thank Deputy Doherty for raising this important question. There is no doubt this storm has caused significant chaos and hardship in many parts of this country, and disproportionately so in the west and north-west of the country; the Deputy is right in that regard. We are all collectively relieved in Ireland, most particularly those communities, that the power is finally back. I know that Deputy Doherty will join me in saying that the Trojan work carried out by workers from the ESB, local authorities, Uisce Éireann and others, on the front line in assisting people has been very important. We should commend and thank them for that.

I wish to make one point, which I said last week. The comments of the chief executive of the ESB, which were perhaps said in a moment of haste or error, were insensitive. I welcome that he was big and decent enough to come out, acknowledge that himself and apologise for the insensitivity of those comments. That is important. In public life, any of us can say something in error or something that is insensitive but it is important to put your hands up afterwards and say that it could have been said in a much better way.

We can come back another day to debate the ministerial presence in the west and north west. In the interests of time, I will not name all my colleagues who serve with diligence in a variety of roles in government. I will come back to that issue another day because we should not actually make the storm a point of political division. In fact, what I have seen over the past number of weeks is this Government working with people the length and breadth of Ireland. Indeed, Sinn Féin ministers were on to me looking for assistance from the Government to help with the storm situation in Northern Ireland because this storm was not partisan. This was a storm that involved everybody who held office putting their shoulder to the wheel and working with agencies and communities in the interest of trying to keep people safe.

I must say that a lot was done right. We have to be conscious that because there was a red weather warning alert, lives were definitely saved in Ireland. In saying that, I, of course, think and acknowledge the loss of the life of Kacper Dudek in the Deputy's constituency. The warning system, however, worked. What we need to get much better at is preparedness and resilience at a community level. If we are being honest with each other, there are parts of the country, even counties that were badly affected, that did better than others in being prepared at that local level by having access to generators and having their local management plans. As part of the Government's review which will kick off shortly, we will need to look at what needs to be done at that local level to build up preparedness. Today, the Taoiseach and I have convened a meeting of relevant Government Ministers to begin to look at exactly how we better prepare for the next storm and for more adverse weather conditions in the future.

As for the financial side, because the Deputy referenced the financial situation, the Minister, Deputy Dara Calleary, who is from the west, led with the Government's humanitarian assistance scheme in which we provided significant financial assistance to many thousands of people to try to help them in a desperately difficult situation, in which the lights were not on and people were trying to still feed and mind children or older people and fulfil care needs. A lot was done and there is a lot of work to do in this regard. I am very clear that the ESB should not - and will not - be gouging any customers on this matter. It has significant resources. The Government also intends to invest significant resources in improving infrastructure. We all, that is, every State agency, commercial or otherwise, Department and every local authority, need to now take the lessons of this storm and be more prepared for future weather events.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

It is not a case of whether the ESB will be gouging people in the future. The ESB has been gouging customers for years. People in the Tánaiste's constituency, in my constituency and right across this State pay among the highest electricity costs in Europe. The ESB made profits of €898 million in the last calendar year we have available. That is a significant amount of profit. In the first 18 months, €1.3 billion has been transferred by individuals paying their electricity bills to the ESB. There are serious amounts of costs in terms of ESB bills, not just in terms of running costs and standing charges. While the CEO of the ESB said his comments were insensitive, he has not ruled out that these costs will be borne by customers in 2026. I am asking the Tánaiste to stand up for people who were left without electricity for weeks on end and to make it clear to the ESB top brass that there will be no increases as a result of this. Not only that, but we also expect the ESB to compensate people. Remember, during the term of the last Government, the ESB was fined €37 million for failures in supply. It needs to start compensating people and show some humility.

Will the Tánaiste call the top brass of the ESB and make those points to them?

Deputies

Hear hear.

The Tánaiste

I thank Deputy Doherty. The long and the short answer is yes, we will be engaging with the ESB. We will also, in line with our programme for Government commitment, be engaging on the issue of energy costs overall. I can point to a number of measures the previous Government took and that this Government will be taking in respect of assisting people with their energy costs. People will remember that the previous Government took a number of measures around energy credits in order to assist people, in the here and now, with the cost of bills. The Deputy be aware that these were welcomed by his constituents, by mine and by people right across the country.

The Deputy will know that in the programme for Government we have also made commitments to keep the lower rate of VAT on energy bills and providing people with certainty for the period ahead. These are the practical measures we are taking right now to assist people with bills which can be large and which can make people feel financially insecure. Government will have a conversation with all State agencies and actors regarding energy prices going forward. We are happy to constructively engage on that.

An Ceann Comhairle

I thank the Tánaiste. We move to Labour Group leader, Deputy Bacik.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

The Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, has had a string of bad luck with ministerial issues. It is a sort of reverse Midas touch. In his previous role, he had to deal with bike shelter and security hut overspends by the OPW. Now, weeks into his new job, we find out about this extraordinary and alarming spend of nearly €7 million on a failed IT project at the Arts Council. This enormous waste of public money raises serious questions about governance and oversight of that body. It raises serious questions about what oversight, if any, the Departments of arts and public expenditure had over such a major IT project that involved a significant spend but that resulted in nothing. It also raises questions about a cover-up by the previous Government, many of the members of which are serving in the new Cabinet.

This unfortunate debacle must not be used to undermine support for the arts or artists. Ireland's contribution to the arts is a source of immense pride. Our paintings, writings, music, film, theatre and comedy are an envy of the world and many artists are not sufficiently rewarded for their work. We in Labour have always championed the arts. President Michael D. Higgins was an inspirational Labour Minister for the arts. We are conscious that many of those who are funded by the Arts Council will be worried today that their vital supports might be undermined as a result of this controversy. The Tánaiste and the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, must reassure artists that their funding will be protected and that we will see full disclosure and accountability for this overspend.

Oireachtas committees are yet to be formed. As a result, we need to have a debate on this in the Dáil next week because it appears that the entire management of this project was shambolic. I would question many aspects of governance and management of the project at the Arts Council and in the Department too.

We all have very serious questions in respect of this issue. Here are some specific questions. First, why has the arts department been so dogged by controversies about overspends and lack of oversight over semi-State bodies? Second, why was there no relevant expertise, it appears, on the Arts Council senior management team, leading to such undue reliance on private contractors to deliver this massive and complex project? Third, were red flags raised by those with knowledge of the project and were their concerns ignored or dismissed? I understand that two reviews of this project, which raised concerns about levels of risk, took place in the summer of 2022 and at the end of 2023. Can the Tánaiste explain why, particularly at that earlier juncture in 2022, a decision was apparently made to proceed with the project notwithstanding serious concerns? Can he make a commitment that the review the Minister has ordered into the Arts Council, which we welcome, will include a root-and-branch review of governance and management systems? I reiterate my call for a Dáil debate on this massive waste, which has caused such anger among the public.

The Tánaiste

A Dáil debate would of course be useful. I agree with Deputy Bacik that if we had committees established - and I hope we will very shortly - I am sure there would be very serious questions asked of the Arts Council. Breaching the public spending code cannot be a consequence-free zone. It simply cannot. These issues are, quite frankly, absolutely alarming. People can make mistakes in terms of the delivery of projects. That is one thing, but it is very different when you just ignore the public spending code and the various approval processes.

There are very serious questions for the Arts Council to answer. In fairness to my colleague the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donovan, he has only been in the Department a couple of weeks. I believe he has acted very swiftly. He briefed Cabinet on the matter yesterday and has commissioned a full external review of the governance and culture at the Arts Council, which Deputy Bacik has welcomed. I absolutely assure the Deputy that no one is happy with what has gone on here. When taxpayers' money is given to the Arts Council, it is for the exact reasons the Deputy has said. It is to support the many brilliant artists and artistic endeavours right across our country. We do not expect it to be spent on a computer system that does not work and we do not expect millions of taxpayers' money to be wasted, with nothing to show for it. There are extraordinarily serious questions for the Arts Council. I have no doubt that as well as the review the Minister has initiated, it is important when the new public accounts committee is established, it will look at this. Looking at the table of the companies involved in this project, at least 20 are listed. It is spreadsheet after spreadsheet. People made significant amounts of money and profited from this, but we do not have a computer system.

I have a very simple philosophy. When we pay someone to manage and run an agency, we expect them to run it properly and in line with the public spending code. There are very serious issues that we already know of. The project cost was not properly estimated by the Arts Council and nor was any final estimate, as is required under the public spending code. Between 2021 and 2024, the Arts Council approved an additional money for the project without approval from the Department, as is also required under the public spending code. The Arts Council frequently changed and extended contracts with certain external suppliers, going over the allowed limits for cost increases in several cases. These actions likely contravene public procurement procedures. In addition, exceeding prescribed contract value limits without retendering breaches EU procurement rules on substantial modifications to contracts. The Arts Council also failed to report these breaches in the chair's letter to the Minister, as required under the code of practice for the governance of State bodies.

Let us be honest. The Arts Council has responsibility for a very sizeable budget which has significantly increased objectively in recent years. There are also issues with regard to the Department's oversight of the Arts Council ,and I do not shirk away from that either. That also has to be a part of the review.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

I thank the Tánaiste for his response. I am glad he has acknowledged there are clearly questions for the Department as well as the Arts Council. I listened to the Minister expressing his anger and disappointment on the radio this morning, but we need more than just expressions of anger and disappointment from the line Minister. We need greater clarity on when he became aware of this. I am conscious he is only recently in the job. As I stated, however, this Government contains many Ministers who were also Ministers in the previous Government. There is also a question of the levels of knowledge of the previous Government about this and about the timelines involved.

We need clarity on the timelines for the review that has been commissioned and we need greater clarity on the timeline of events which led to this overspend. I reviewed the 2023 annual report of the Arts Council which is now online. The report of the chair, drafted in June 2024, makes no mention of any of this. Artists and all of us must have confidence in the Arts Council, in its senior management and in the Department of the arts, because, as the Tánaiste said, there is so much public money at stake here. It is important that our artists are properly supported.

In restoring that confidence, it is important that we have a root-and-branch review of the Arts Council processes and internal culture, of the level of the Department's oversight and of public procurement rules.

An Ceann Comhairle

Thank you, Deputy.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

I reiterate my call for a Dáil debate on this.

The Tánaiste

I have already said I think that would be a good idea. The Minister has been in the post for approximately two weeks. I am not sure he could have acted much more quickly at all. In fact, it would have been impossible to have acted more quickly in terms of bringing this issue to Cabinet. To be very clear, because Deputy Bacik has said it twice, this issue was not brought to the attention of the previous Government. It would have been preferable had it been. As recently as this morning, I had that matter checked with both the Secretary General of the Department of arts and with the secretary to the Government as well. The Department adopted a view that it was endeavouring to get on top of the issue or gather all the facts. I do not think that is a good position. It should have been highlighted at a much earlier stage.

Artists have been let down. The Arts Council does and has done great work, however, it has been let down by those who are running the organisation and who have left us with this mess, which contravenes the public spending code. That is what the initial examination tells us. Of course, there will have to be a full external review. The results of that will obviously have to be published, and we are happy to engage constructively on it.

An Ceann Comhairle

I thank the Tánaiste. We move now to Aontú and Deputy Tóibín.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

The Tánaiste says there should not be a consequence-free zone. This Government is a consequence-free zone. This Government is an accountability-free zone when it comes to waste. You speak about the Arts Council IT waste as some kind of shock, as if you are a passenger on the ship of State.

You are at the helm of the ship of State in the context of these issues.

I could spend the full day here giving a litany of Government projects in respect of which there has been waste, week after week, in the past four or five years. There is deep frustration among taxpayers at the level of Government waste. The Arts Council incinerated €7 million of State funding. We have nothing to show for that. What we have is a Government - the same Government that was in place a few weeks ago - shrugging its shoulders and saying it does not know what happened. That is an incredible answer for any Government to give.

I honestly believe that there is a culture of waste that is coming from the top. One of the pivotal issues of the general election campaign was the Tánaiste stating that he did not sign the contract for the national children's hospital. This culture of evasion, dodging, delaying and obfuscating is coming from the top and is seeping into every level of the senior Civil Service.

Let us look at the number of people who are involved. We had a senior Minister. Where was the oversight? We had junior Ministers. Where was the oversight? We had Secretaries General. Where was the oversight? We had directors and chairs of the Arts Council. Where was the oversight? We had an audit committee in the Arts Council. Where was the oversight? We have loads of people who are getting massive wages to oversee the spending of State money - citizens' money - and nobody is doing their job. Week after week, people are cursed to wake up to the next instalment of Government waste. People have had enough of this. People make jokes about the bicycle shed and the wall around the WRC. It is not a joke. What is happening to taxpayers' money is disgusting, and we cannot tolerate it any further.

We in Aontú have stated that it should be written into the contracts of senior civil servants that they have a responsibility to mind taxpayers' money. We have stated that there should be a junior Minister in the Department of the Taoiseach to report on live contracts to make sure they are not going over budget or over time in terms of delivery and that this person should report to the Taoiseach on a weekly basis in order that there would be full oversight of what is happening. Of course, this has not been done. We have stated very clearly that there has to be a cost to senior civil servants in terms of this waste. That cost should be up to including the loss of a person's job. If there is no cost involved, there will be no change and we will be talking about this forever.

The Tánaiste

Certainly, nobody on this side of the House in any way laughs about such matters. The Deputy is entirely correct. They are extraordinarily serious matters. Men and women get up every morning, go to work, do a hard day's work and pay their taxes, and they want to see those taxes spent well to deliver for them and their families and communities.

It is also fair to say, however, that Government can only be accountable for what it is told. If there are officials in State agencies or others who are pursuing a project that does not adhere to the public spending code, that is not a small matter and it cannot and will not be a consequence-free zone. Let us be very clear. There are very serious consequences for politicians. We have a thing called an election. We put our name on a ballot paper and people in our communities go out and choose to vote or not vote for us. Everyone in here, including the Deputy, receives a mandate. People are getting a bit sick and tired, to put it mildly, of public money not being spent adequately and, as in this case, there being nothing to show for it. The Deputy is right about that. They are also tired of finding that there are individuals who are often somewhat anonymous when it comes to these issues.

Let us be clear - I am very clear on this too - that people can make mistakes. We do not want a culture where people are risk averse. People are going to say "That's different". It is absolutely different; but when a mistake is made, you have to engage. This was not an example of that. In my view, this was a very clear and flagrant breach of the public spending code.

I want to balance my comments by saying that in Ireland we do deliver an awful lot of projects very well. Our public servants deliver a lot of projects well, on budget, on time and even ahead of time and ahead of budget on occasion. The Deputy says he can list many projects. I can also list many projects that were delivered on budget and on time, be it the Moycullen bypass, the Dunkettle interchange or the Listowel bypass, to name just some in recent times. Other examples include new school extensions, new primary care centres, major hospital extensions like that relating to the Mater Hospital and St. Luke's Hospital in Kilkenny and the national broadband plan, which is the modern equivalent of rural electrification and which is on budget and ahead of schedule.

The Deputy is quite right. Today, we should be talking about the issue relating to the Arts Council. I do not dispute that, but we also deliver very many projects across the public service on time and on budget. I say this to be balanced in my comments. What has happened in the Arts Council is a cause of serious concern, however. What concerns me, as Tánaiste and as a coalition leader, is the question of whether it is confined just to this project and how we can have confidence in the overall governance structure and systems within the Arts Council and, as Deputy Bacik rightly identified, in departmental oversight of agencies. The responsible thing to do here is exactly what the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, proposed to Cabinet, namely establishing in the coming week an external review to get to the bottom of these matters and to report and for the Committee of Public Accounts and others to have an opportunity to examine this issue.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

There is a policy sometimes on the part of senior Ministers to hear no evil and see no evil and to say "Oh, we didn't know what was happening." The Tánaiste mentioned that before. It is the responsibility of a Minister to know what is happening in his or her Department. You cannot insulate yourself from crises such as this by pleading ignorance over and over again. That is not an excuse when it comes to waste.

We do not even have the opportunity to bring the former Minister, Catherine Martin, before a committee of the Oireachtas because 11 weeks after the election, there are no committees. I understand it is unlikely that there will be any committees for a number of weeks, which, again, shows us the dysfunction of and the glacial pace of accountability within the system.

This is not a victimless crime. When you burn through so much money, there is a cost. The amount involved would have paid for 25 homes and we could have put 75 people into those homes. It would have paid for 600 scoliosis operations. It would have paid for six CAMHS teams around the country. Not only is the Government burning up taxpayers' money, it is taking away that critically needed cash from the people who need it most.

The Tánaiste

I accept the Deputy's passion on this matter. Perhaps I speak in a calmer tone than he does on occasion, but I ask that he please not misunderstand that. There is absolute fury on Government benches in respect of this situation. The people we represent - the people who voted for us and the mandates we have received - are extraordinarily annoyed about this matter. The Deputy is right. Almost €7 million of taxpayers' money that was given to the Arts Council has been wasted, with nothing to show for it. As deputy head of this Government, I am saying to the Deputy with absolute clarity that there will be consequences for that. We will establish what happened. We will have an external review and the Government will then decide how to act.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

It will move on. Nobody will lose their job.

The Tánaiste

That is what a responsible Government does. A responsible Government also garners the facts. Let us do that. We do not need faux outrage. What we need are the facts. Gather the facts and then Government will make a proper determination when it has the information. That is what some of the Deputy's colleagues on the Opposition benches have rightly called for. We need to go through this by means of an external review. We will get to the bottom of this. Breaching the public sector spending code is not consequence free.