I thank Sinn Féin again for the second motion on this issue in seven months. Deputy Whitmore asked what the Minister is going to do if there is a full-out strike. What would that look like? I remember a full-out strike of the fire service in Dublin Airport in the late-1990s. The Ryanair baggage handlers had gone on strike and solidarity for them started to spread through every sector, starting with the shop workers of Aer Rianta, on to the airport police and, ultimately, to the firefighters in Dublin Airport. When …

Following the historic vote last night on the Bill to amend the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018 and the very welcome free vote allowed by the Government parties, it is reported that the Taoiseach has conceded this morning that the Bill may pass through the system much more quickly than the Government had planned. That is from the horse's mouth. Will the Minister confirm that the Government will support the expeditious proceeding of the Bill to Committee Stage, in line with the O'Shea report…

I am sharing my time with Deputy Boyd Barrett. People Before Profit also wishes to note the passing of Michael Viney. He is a great loss to the nation. Nature was his passion and he shared it with us both widely and wildly. He is already missed. Having heard the statements on the biodiversity crisis and the proceedings of the various committee meetings on its scale and scope, I am not aware of any Deputy who has denied the scientific reports and research that state we are effectively experiencing the sixth mass ext…

Tomorrow morning, Marie O'Shea will present at the health committee on her review of the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018. I have two asks of the Government parties here today. I know people are concerned about the Bill that I have before the House and which will be voted on tomorrow night. I understand there are concerns left, right and centre about this issue, but I ask the Government parties to listen to that meeting with Marie O'Shea in the morning and to listen first hand to the very mu…

-----it would only be correct for those parties to give their Deputies a free vote-----

-----and please to listen to the health committee before they make up their mind.

But we would be waiting a whole year.

It is a whole year that the Government is parking it.

I received a reply to a parliamentary question from the Minister for Justice stating that the report into the tragic and untimely death of Shane O'Farrell, commissioned with the co-operation of Judge Gerard Haughton, was presented on 1 June 2022. In a couple of days, that will have been a year ago. After 12 years of Lucia O'Farrell and her family fighting like tigers to have this report published and have a full public inquiry established, and after this Dáil and the Seanad voting in favour of same, out of respect …

In the same vein, there is a report in this morning's edition of the Irish Independent about a summer of discontent. The article listed a series of workers who have voted for strike action. As well as water workers, they include firefighters, paramedics in the National Ambulance Service, emergency call operators in Munster and pilots at Emerald Airlines. We already know that nurses have voted for strike action over safe staffing levels, while the scientists who took strike action last year are before the Labour Cou…

I thank Sinn Féin for bringing this motion to us. The figures in the motion are stark. Three quarters of families get no respite care at all. In 2022 fewer than 5,200 received a respite service, despite the fact that there are 20,000 people or more with disabilities, including physical and sensory disabilities, or autism who need respite care. Fewer people received respite services last year, in 2022, than they did in 2018. We have to acknowledge, and it would be a really good start for the Government to acknowledg…

I ask the Minister about the core funding model for childcare, how it is applied across all providers and the number of childcare providers that participated in this scheme, but subsequently raised their fees for services, despite the commitment in the scheme not to do so. Has the Department received any complaints about this? If so, how does the Department deal with the service providers concerned? Are there any penalties? I ask the Minister to make a statement on the matter.

I welcome the fact the Minister has tried to reduce the fees, but some of the larger providers - in the case of the parliamentary questions I have asked the Minister and in this case - such as Safari Childcare in Dublin 8, have brought in a model where they have said to parents they have to avail of the service 52 weeks per year. In other words, parents who do not normally pay for after-school care during the school holidays, because there is no school, are now being told that if they do not do so, their children's…

We certainly do. I hope that continues to be the commitment from the Department. However, it is not rhetorical to say - it goes to core of the issue - that what is happening here is we have a disjointed, privatised and fragmented childcare service in this country. We would not allow this to happen at primary or second level, but the care is a patchwork of various different types of service and capacity, essentially to deal with the private provision of childcare in this country. I recently visited my local childcar…

I am asking these questions on behalf of Deputy Boyd Barrett. It asks whether the Minister is aware of the national representative survey carried out by Barnardos but I am quite sure the Minister is aware of it. I thank Barnardos for conducting the survey and shining a spotlight on this very important issue. The survey received responses from over 315 parents or guardians with children under the age of 18 in their care and found that up to half of them have had to go without heat, electricity, food, clothing or oth…

Perhaps the Minister is not aware of the report, which is entitled Cost of Living Crisis: Impact on Children Report 2023. The Minister has not addressed the cost-of-living crisis and its impact in the immediate term. Instead he tells me that his Department has a strategy from 2023 to 2028. How does that resolve the issues for families, 57% of whom, when asked, said they could not afford to allow their children to take part in social activities, 23% of whom said they could not afford school trips or activities and 4…

The Minister still has not answered the question and he certainly has not addressed the Barnardos report. It is about the cost-of-living increases and their current and immediate impact. The report looks in particular at the past six months compared with the previous year and the impact these increases are having on children. It even states that they are "having an extremely detrimental or substantially negative impact on the health and well-being of the children in the families they support". The Minister is proud…

On 24 January of this year the Minister announced a new policy to leave some international protection refugees without accommodation. That, as could have been predicted, has resulted in hundreds of refugees living on the streets, making them, as was warned would happen, very vulnerable. As day follows night, they have faced absolutely unjustified racist attacks from racists and fascists. I want to know how many refugees have been left without accommodation since this policy was introduced in January and how many th…

I would argue with the Minister that the announcement he made in January was deeply irresponsible and has left hundreds of people at risk. I say that because it was aimed specifically at international protection refugees. This has been a proxy for a policy operating along racial lines. It was not aimed at the greater number of Ukrainians who are coming in; it was aimed at international protection refugees, the majority of whom are black and brown men. It has opened up the potential of leaving them to the mercy of o…

To make the accusation that the announcement specifically targeted international protection refugees?