International Bodies
Dail Éireann — 2026-05-28
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Mairéad Farrell (SF), Galway West

The issue here is that in the spirit of the Bilderberg conference, which is a secretive conference, the Minister has not given me a full breakdown of exactly what he did and what he was discussing. It is only through a freedom of information request we have an insight into what he got up to. We also need to see it in the context of the time. When fuel protestors were out on the streets demanding the Minister's Government intervene just so they could make ends meet he was in Washington DC spending $760 a night of taxpayers' money on a luxury five-star hotel. While working families up and down the State were unable to afford to fill their tanks with fuel he was spending money on business class flights to the tune of thousands of euro and in total the trip cost the taxpayer €6,800. During a cost-of-living crisis why on Earth should taxpayers fund that type of trip while still not being aware of exactly what was being discussed?

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-05-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-21T01:01:08+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-28