The Minister of State is very welcome. I wish her all the best in her role. The current programme for Government is no different from the previous one. It commits to working tirelessly, alongside stakeholders, advocates, families and departmental officials, to ensure the commitments made under the programme are not just words on paper but actions with impact. As my colleague Senator Murphy O'Mahony noted, when the Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, instructed that responsibility for disability services be moved from the De…

I thank the Minister of State for her time. When is it proposed to sit again?

Is that agreed? Agreed.

I thank the Minister of State for taking this Commencement matter. While I know it is not his brief, I appreciate the time he has taken to come to the House to take it this morning. In my Commencement matter, I asked that the Minister of State with responsibility for public health, well-being and the national drugs strategy, Deputy Murnane O'Connor, come before the Seanad to provide a detailed breakdown of the budget and the supports contained within it. I have before me the Healthy Ireland Framework report, which …

I thank the Minister of State for going off script and acknowledging his deep understanding of my ask. I am no different from anybody else. My kids have moved on and are in their 20s now, but I was a parent who did not have information. I have no doubt that if I was a parent of teenagers at the moment, be it boys or girls, having seen the programme that was released last week I would accept there is a huge awareness and information gap. Parents are willing to come together and work as collective communities. We hav…

I move amendment No. 1: To delete all words after "That Seanad Éireann:" and substitute the following: "notes that: - a child’s right to education is enshrined in the Constitution and, under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, must be accessible on an equal basis with others in the community in which they live; and - the Government is committed to ensuring that each child with a special educational need has an appropriate school place, in line with their constitutional right an…

Yet again, I stand here and ask whether the Leader could work with us to bring in the Minister with responsibility for children's cyber safety. We are sleepwalking through one of the biggest epidemics ever known here and the hugely negative impact social media is having on the youth and society. It is past time that Ireland recognised the damage caused every second of every day to children and teens who are allowed unmonitored access to these devices and the harmful apps associated with them. How many more young li…

I ask the Deputy Leader to call the Minister for sport to the Chamber. I wish to discuss the outcomes of the sports capital grant which has been allocated for the past five years, with an emphasis on whether the Department has audited the outcomes of the huge investment of nearly €500 million. This investment was made under the pillars of what the sports capital funding was set up for, which were inclusion, diversity, women in sport, the environment and impacts on the community. The reason I am asking for this to b…

If I may interrupt the Senator for just a moment, there is a vote in the Dáil. Does the Minister of State need to attend?

As the Senator has just started and there is three minutes to go until the vote, the Minister of State is permitted to leave if she would like to and we can then start again. Is that okay?

I apologise. We will continue afterwards, with the agreement of the House. We have no choice. The Minister of State has to go. Is it agreed to suspend the House for the duration of the vote? Agreed.

I call Senator Nessa Cosgrove. With the permission of the Minister of State, I will allow Senator Cosgrove to start again because it is important to keep the flow of it.

We will stick to the time for the rest of the session in order that everyone can get their Commencement matter in.

Before the Minister of State responds, I welcome the exchange students from Georgetown Visitation School in the US and the students from their host school in County Louth, who are in the Gallery. How apt that we are having a conversation on education. Thank you for joining us today.

I must be very strict on time in order to begin the next business at 4 p.m. I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Moran.

I thank the Leader for being here this morning. I will use my time to discuss universal design guidelines for changing places toilets. It was a good colleague of the Leader, the then Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, who brought forward the change in regulations for Part M 2022. The changing of the regulations was to ensure that all of our local authorities would be in a position to make their public buildings more accessible and inclusive, particularly as regards changing spaces. On top of that, the centre fo…

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Buttimer, back again. He has a busy agenda this morning in the Seanad.

I welcome Deputy Danny Healy-Rae and his visitors to the Gallery.

I welcome the Minister to the Seanad and wish her all the best in the role. In the two minutes allocated to me, I am going to focus on two important issues relating to accident and emergency departments, training and this environment. We need to ensure that when a parent brings a child, a teenager, young adult or an older adult who is neurodiverse or has intellectual disabilities that there is a space there for a sick person to be seen. They need to feel safe and have their rights protected. I welcome the Minister'…

I welcome the Minister to the Seanad. I thank Fine Gael for tabling this welcome motion. I appreciate being allocated time to speak on it. The motion is a comprehensive one that covers an array of what needs to be done in the older age sector. Last year alone, 24 million hours were delivered when it came to home care. Some 320 day care centres were open right across the country. We have 55 dementia-specific day centres and the motion is calling on a further 20 to be added to that. The budget for meals on wheels has…