People who do not wish to pay the tax may choose to purchase illicit cigarettes.

We have very little time to deal with what is a very important resolution before us. I will try to be as brief as I can. The Labour Party fully participated in the all-party committee on climate change. We subscribed, after immense amounts of work by all parties, to its conclusions. Part of that, a comprehensive suite of measures, was an increase in carbon taxes. That is why we will not resile from that now. That is the acid test of seriousness about altering the build-up of carbon in the atmosphere and we must pla…

This particular measure to reduce the VAT rate on the hospitality sector to 9% was a measure that former Deputy Michael Noonan and I introduced to deal with the last economic crisis that we were facing but that was a different crisis. We were trying to encourage people into restaurants and so on but we now have a public health policy that prevents that. In that context, it is debatable how impactful this will be in the short term and it is quite an expensive mechanism, at €401 million. I agree that conditionality i…

I am glad to have the opportunity to say a few words about the upcoming European Council summit on 15 and 16 October. The first thing listed in the published agenda highlights is EU-UK relations. Apparently, the Council is going to take stock of the implementation of the withdrawal agreement and review the state of negotiations. Other issues on the agenda include climate change and external relations, including EU-Africa relations. It is probably no surprise that most of us here will concentrate, in the few minutes…

The Leas-Cheann Comhairle was right about the time.

Is there a script available?

The introduction by the UK of the Internal Market Bill seems, to most sensible observers, the final act of madness in the bizarre handling of the withdrawal negotiations by the Johnson Government. To admit openly the intention of a sovereign government to break an international agreement in the midst of trying to negotiate a new agreement simply beggars belief for most of us. The unified reaction from the European Union, together with the very strong, sane voices that emerged from within the British political syste…

I am very proud to support the Labour Party's Bill. I believe that sick pay is a moral imperative. It was a moral imperative before Covid-19 but it is absolutely one now. While we can look back to say, "Why was this not done earlier?", we can do it now. We are not reinventing the wheel. Despite the Tánaiste's comments in The Irish Times today, as long as these provisions are not enacted, the lack of statutory sick pay will remain a fundamental weakness in our all-out fight to defeat this awful virus. As colleagues …

We are adding statutory sick pay.

Tell the truth.

I too congratulate the new Minister of State at the Department of Justice and Equality, my constituency colleague, Deputy Browne, and I wish him every success in his appointment. It is a demanding role and a demanding Department. I was spokesman in the area in the past and one spends a lot of time in this Chamber because half of the legislation that comes though these Houses comes from the Department of Justice and Equality. We should look at that situation, because it is not possible to give priority to all the ar…

I am very glad to have the opportunity to speak on the Defence (Amendment) Bill 2020. It is a while since I spoke on a defence matter. I apologise to the Minister for missing his speech. I am very anxious to hear the Minister's presentation of any legislation before I speak, but I am afraid because of the earlier votes in the House I was caught up in the Committee on Dáil Reform and missed the Minister's speech. There is considerable merit in some of the commentary I heard about how we, collectively as a House and …

That is what I understand. Under the Defence Act 1954, the military command of, and all executive and administrative powers in respect of, the Defence Forces, including the power to delegate command and authority, are exercisable by the Government through and by the Minister for Defence. In other words, officers exercise military command through the delegated command authority of the Minister. One might wonder why the Minister could not then make a delegation order to cover this point. As far as I understand it, th…

The definition of "operational control" is: the authority delegated to a Force Commander in respect of a contingent assigned to him or her so that the Force Commander may— (a) accomplish certain missions or tasks which are limited by function, time or location, (b) deploy the contingent, and (c) retain or assign tactical control of the contingent, but does not include the authority to assign separate employment of any component of the contingent. I read these particular lines of the Bill a couple of times to try to…

We will debate this when the Minister is responding.

The Bill envisages an order by the Minister for Defence which spells out the delegation and specifies what is not delegated.

We will see that. It seems the right thing to do. I just wanted to understand what exactly that line meant. As other speakers mentioned, the Bill also includes a provision which enables the State to give full effect to the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict by deleting provisions relating to the enlistment of persons under the age of 18. As I understand it, this again simply reflects existing practice. I am certainly not in any way advocat…

Is there----

I know that. I am sorry; I know it is not in order and I apologise but I find it helpful to have a banter with the Minister. When we were passing the omnibus Bill in March, we assumed there would be a facility for people who wanted to re-enlist to be welcomed back. If there is a big disparity between the numbers who have applied and the numbers who have been accepted, it would be interesting to hear why that is the case and, perhaps, the categories of people involved. That is again something the Minister might retu…

I move amendment No. 1: In page 5, to delete line 14. The amendment pertains to section 3 of the Bill, which provides entry and inspection of relevant premises by members of An Garda Síochána. Section 3 states: 3. (1) Any member, whether in uniform or not, may enter without a warrant any relevant premises at any time and there make such inspection, examination, observation and enquiry as he or she may think proper for- (a) the purposes of giving a direction under section 31A(7) of the Act of 1947, whether in relati…