I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important Bill. In 2018, the people of this country voted to overhaul how we approach the issue of termination of pregnancies. We voted to give women control of their own bodies and their own healthcare. Five years on, we are still striving to provide an adequate system of healthcare for these services countrywide. This Bill seeks to fulfil and vindicate a long-standing commitment by the Government to provide for safe access zones at healthcare settings carrying out these …

I tend to look at these things positively. I regard the opportunity to establish the agency as a really positive step in a process that I know the Minister is extremely serious about. Violence against women in this State is reaching an epidemic level. In this regard, I would go even further than the witness from IHREC who appeared before the justice committee. I was very pleased to hear the Minister say she believes she will have a draft Bill for consideration in the coming months. That is absolutely imperative. We…

The Minister might be surprised to hear that if a person pucked a sliotar from the Cuckoo stream, which is just off the Malahide Road in my constituency, it would hit the site on which she is proposing to build a Garda station.

I was not aware the project was so advanced and I am very pleased to hear it. People refer to the community it will serve as the north fringe because it is located between Fingal and Dublin city. It is important that it should get a Garda station. In agreeing with Deputy Howlin's call for some form of framework for setting out, at the least, a strategy for the delivery of, or upgrades to, Garda stations across the country, I ask that the Minister and Commissioner might look at the likes of Donabate, which is underg…

I am supportive of any measure that will enhance the capacity and the capability of An Garda Síochána. The reason I asked this as a separate question to the one on body-worn cameras has to do with the caution that is associated with the idea of facial recognition software and the concerns that have been expressed by NGOs and State actors that I know the Minister is only too familiar with. The code of practice will be a crucial element of this as the legislation is developed. I certainly look forward to working cons…

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I commend the Minister of State and the Department on the work that is being done to strengthen our national parks and wildlife. There is an awful lot to be done. I believe that this Government has taken notable strides in increasing funding for the National Parks and Wildlife Service and building a framework that will ensure sustainability into the future. The work of the National Parks and Wildlife Service underpins so much of the work carried out to protect…

Come on, Mattie.

I commend the Minister of State and his Department on bringing forward the Bill and the work that is ongoing with this and associated Bills, which I understand will be published this summer. Like others, I lament the fact it has taken some time for this Bill to reach the House, but I know the committee had a small hand in that today. I, like other Members of this House, am acutely aware of the impact the cost-of-living crisis is having on the lives of people we represent. The energy market saw significant disruptio…

One of the biggest constraints we have in this country is the left's obsession with trying to label people who are not on the left with them. They throw in various comments to suggest that we do not know what we are doing. A real anti-European sentiment was expressed too in the time that I have been sitting in this Chamber. It was covert but fairly obvious. We need to challenge those remarks. If one looks at the Irish economy's output and the number of jobs, people and families it has supported over the last 30 yea…

Health outcomes have increased. Educational output and prowess and our foreign affairs prowess in the world have increased. We now have a life expectancy that is one of the highest in Europe. All of these things are down to collective agreements that we have made and the Irish people have voted on. For those opposite to claim there is some conspiracy to put down the small people is complete nonsense. It is the opposite. It has its flaws of course, but so do all forms of politics on the political spectrum. This one …

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I echo some of Deputy McAuliffe's remarks, particularly earlier, when he referred to the potential response that the State, that the citizenry of the State, might have made a number of decades ago had referendums been put to them as regards the manner in which courts may have dealt with criminality, particularly in the 1970s and 1980s. It is something to reflect on and something I think all of us reflect on when these debates come up every summer. However, I s…

For years the Special Criminal Court has been at the forefront of bringing to justice leading criminals within Ireland, and that includes names like John Gilligan, Slab Murphy, Lisa Smith and, of course, Jonathan Dowdall, to name just some. Despite the success of the Special Criminal Court in securing justice for victims of organised crime and terror in Ireland, it is rather shameful that the largest Opposition party in this State and in Dáil Éireann remains unwilling and unable to support the renewal of the Specia…

-----Sinn Féin must now of course be realising that the public sees through their position on this court. Why else would they have switched their approach in recent years to abstaining from the vote? I believe they did so because they felt shame in the position, which was indefensible. In recent weeks they have engaged in a hypocritical campaign that is designed purely to mislead the public as to Sinn Féin's belief about the Special Criminal Court. Today, we even saw a Member for whom I have a high regard use the t…

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I eagerly await the publication of this crucial review. As Deputy Shanahan has rightly pointed out, it gives us an opportunity to rebalance and reopen potential lines up and down the country, which is something of which we should all be supportive. One of the matters I hope will be covered in the review is the obvious need for the three- or possibly even four-tracking of our northern commuter line, particularly in the suburban and city limits, to facilitate more trans…

Speed and sustainability are clearly the ambition for all of us when it comes to this review's publication throughout the country and not just on my own commuter line. For sustainability in the modern environment, apart from freight clearly it must be electric. My personal ambition would be to see the electrification of the entire network in the coming decades, primarily for the purposes of ensuring that we can withdraw diesel or even hybrids from the rail network, exclusively for passengers of course. I appreciate…

I ask Deputy Doherty to stick to the time allotted, please.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the statements on the youth justice strategy. I commend Deputy Mattie McGrath on moving the business of the House along so much. I am standing in for my colleagues who are en route but who will be taking up a later slot. I listened carefully to the Minister of State’s contribution at the start of this debate, as well as the contributions of other Members. It is very clear that services directed towards the intervention and prevention of crime can play a significant and piv…

I would like to raise the issue of body cameras for gardaí. This follows the revelation, via a parliamentary question that I posed in recent weeks, that 2,080 assaults have been carried out against gardaí since 2015. I understand that procurement will begin immediately and that a Bill has been approved by the Cabinet today to allow for safe and ethical use of facial recognition technology on a retrospective basis. What assurances can the Taoiseach give me that such safeguards will be in place with regard to the use…

I raise the issue of recruitment and retention in An Garda Síochána. As the Minister knows, since the reopening of Templemore we have been very consistent in increasing the numbers to in and around 14,000. However, there are issues, which I think have been noted in this sphere in the Department of Justice, regarding recruitment and retention. The question as to whether that is due to rostering, the terms and conditions of employment or an economic by-product of being at full employment is something we do not know. …

We have 12 minutes left for the next grouping.