Irish Examiner view: A vision for sustainable growth

Water Pipes at the Uisce Éireann Water Treatment plant on Lee Rd, Cork. To think we are living with seriously compromised water supplies means there is a lot to be done. Picture: David Creedon

With the revised national development plan to be revealed today, and with it plans for spending €200bn on infrastructure projects, people need to see workable projects which can be brought in on time and within budget.

With a focus on housing, water, transport, and energy, the updated plan needs to be a bold and imaginative document that lays the groundwork to transform infrastructure over the next decade.

Historically, we have been rather good at drawing up expansive and far-sighted strategies for nationally important projects. We have been less successful in actually delivering them, be that to a satisfactory conclusion or within time and financial projections.

Of course, there have been outstanding successes in the State’s history, such as the rural electrification programme or the Shannon hydroelectric scheme, both monumental projects which transformed the country’s energy landscape. 

The ESB’s work at Turlough Hill in Wicklow in the 1970s, whereby the top of a mountain was removed to create a massive reservoir which could be emptied and refilled to power turbines to create renewable electricity at times of peak demand, showed initiative and engineering at its very best.

The delivery of such projects was widely acclaimed both here and abroad as visionary and also as having had a massive impact on the ability of this country to deliver for its citizens.

Latterly, though, we have been less successful in the delivery of practical and necessary projects — the National Children’s Hospital being a case in point.

The Coalition is only too well aware of the general scepticism regarding its ability to successfully deliver on any of the promises it made in its programme for government. The national development plan, therefore, is crucial to establishing its credibility.

We are a wealthy and prosperous country. To think we are living with seriously compromised water supplies, an incomplete motorway network, a fragile energy grid, and no rail links to our major airports means there is a lot to be done.

The Government needs to set us on a path for sustainable growth and development and must not fall into a financial morass created by poor planning and financial mismanagement.

We have been down that road too many times already.

Fresh thinking on prisons needed

We have known for some time now that the prison system is creaking under the weight of the sheer numbers of people it is trying to cater for.

The latest figures from the Irish Prison Service show there are more than 5,500 inmates at present, some 860 more than there is physical capacity for. As a result, the overflow is being catered for on bunk beds in cells designed for no more than two occupants, or on mattresses on cell floors.

Alternative solutions include the expansion of temporary release rules to include sex offenders or widespread discounting of sentences, both of which are political non-starters.

The reopening of jails previously closed because of their unsuitability as modern prison facilities has also been mooted, but is problematic.

Overcrowding presents risks to both inmates and staff alike and the Department of Justice is going to have to look to creating alternative solutions.

Tackling the root causes of why people end up in jail is one way of approaching it, as is the need to look at exactly who is being incarcerated and why. Other countries have shown there are a variety of methods that can be used as alternatives to jail time, particularly in the Netherlands, where the prison population has been dramatically cut in recent years.

The delivery of additional spaces in existing facilities has already been approved at Cabinet level, but the fact remains that the way forward is keeping people out of jail, rather than seeing ever expanding numbers sent to overcrowded facilities.

Long-term thinking is needed in order to solve this crisis and it is needed fast. Stuffing our prisons with ever greater numbers is obviously not the answer.

New online rules necessary

As welcome as the prospect of the end of an era of self-regulation in the tech sector might appear, the thorny issue of actually policing the new online safety code is a source of considerable concern.

The new Comisiún na Meán rules which hope to address the issues facing young people, in particular, and society, in general, when it comes to online media consumption came into effect yesterday. What remains to be seen is how useful these will be and who exactly is going to police them.

Big Tech is, of course, unhappy with the new regulations. X, formerly Twitter, has already taken a High Court action on supposed “regulatory overreach”. However, the aims of the regulators are essentially sound.

The commission wants companies such as TikTok, YouTube, X, Facebook, and Instagram to be accountable for keeping their users — specifically children — safe online. That they were able to go unregulated for so long allowed them to become cocksure about their legal and moral
responsibilities.

Making the new rules work is problematic as they are basically suggestions rather than mandates and, as we know, these are easy to take liberties with.

It is all very well for regulators to be idealistic about the realities of online content, but it is still going to be extremely hard to make social media firms bend to their will.

While most people believe the new rules to be necessary to make the internet safer, hoping that Big Tech will comply is idealistic at best.

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