That is the key issue.

I thank the Minister of State for his introductory remarks. I repeat the same thing I have heard said many times this week by quite a number of Teachtaí Dála and Opposition Members, that is, what is happening here with legislation and last-minute changes shoehorned into Committee and Report Stages in the Seanad is deeply disturbing and an attempt by the Government to bypass the Dáil and any scrutiny of contentious and often complex legislation. Moreover, in many cases this week it is legislation that has the potent…

I am well aware of that. I was merely pointing out-----

The Unplanned Pregnancy and Abortion Care, UnPAC, study commissioned by the HSE is welcome and confirms concerns that many of us have about abortion access in this country. In particular, UnPAC states, "Conditions put in place … are anything but compassionate." This has to be of particular concern regarding fatal foetal anomalies. Here we have a problem in that abortion is criminalised. Does the Taoiseach agree that abortion care is a health issue and not a crime?

My question relates to the situation whereby there are 9,000 childcare spaces the providers of which have refused to accept participation in any of the schemes that are available. The condition that providers must not raise fees does not apply to them. I am seeking clarity on the position of parents, particularly in parts of Dublin in which spaces are very scarce and there is a real problem for parents in this regard when a provider does not accept any of the funding streams the Minister is providing and charges th…

The Minister’s figures are interesting. While it is very good that 96% of providers have signed up to the scheme, that still leaves 4% who have not. The figures the Minister gave me referred to approximately 9,000 places in Dublin City and in Cork and in Limerick, but there are another 12,000 places nationally and the relevant providers have refused to sign up to any scheme. Those providers are then free to push up the cost to parents. Regarding that small percentage of providers, desperate parents come to my clini…

I still maintain that there are 12,000 places in respect of which providers have not signed up. I suspect that they are probably, in the main, the more commercial and bigger childcare providers. That information is not in the answer, so I cannot elaborate on it. We are still left, though, and this is the problem, with a dysfunctional, fragmented and piecemeal approach to childcare. The Minister is doing better than anyone has done before, but we are being left open to the consequences of the fact that we spend less…

In a shameful decision yesterday, the European Union voted to greenwash fossil, gas and nuclear power. I note that all, bar one, of the Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil MEPs voted the wrong way. The Green Party MEPs voted the right way, in other words, not to greenwash fossil, gas and nuclear power. There are four days, until 11 July, for the Irish Government and the Minister, Deputy Ryan, as the Minister responsible, to lodge an objection to this outcome to the European Council. I am asking the Minister please not to go …

Likewise, I think this should have been separate legislation. It is very important legislation. Many of us participated in the committee that looked at repealing the eighth amendment of the Constitution, as did the Minister. The recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly dealt with this issue quite substantially. One thing that we know substantially reduces crisis pregnancies is the provision of contraception. I wish to make similar points to Deputy Cullinane regarding amendment No. 6. One provision that is really v…

This measure is a massive step forward. It is the four-year anniversary of when we voted to repeal the eighth amendment. Part of the commitment to the people of Ireland at the time were the ancillary recommendations from the Citizens' Assembly and the Oireachtas committee, which included free contraception for all. We waited for four years and we are now rushing this through. I accept the points that have been made. It is a shame we are rushing this Bill through with that particular clause contained in it. The Mini…

I do not know what the legal opinion is. The Minister is not showing it to us. There is a major contradiction in us being able to provide termination of pregnancy, free of charge, to people under the age of 17, but we are not prepared to provide them with the contraception that would prevent pregnancy in the first place. I find this bizarre. I will not push it to a vote either because nobody wants to stop the provision of free contraception to people, even with the age limits that are outlined in the Bill. We hope …

I am sharing time with Deputy Barry. I welcome everybody to the Gallery. I always think it sends a powerful message into the House on what democracy means. We can sit here chatting all day in a vacuum but to have people from the outside with real lived experience coming in sends a powerful message and I hope the Minister of State also recognises that. People Before Profit welcomes this Bill and we will support it as a step in the right direction. Supports for those with autism are shockingly poor. We need a strateg…

I move amendment No. 2: In page 4, after line 37, to insert the following: “(c) place a moratorium on connections to the national grid by high energy users such as data centres,”. I will start by expressing utter disgust at what we heard here yesterday from the Chairperson of the Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action, Deputy Brian Leddin. He accused us, who expressed concerns about the proliferation of data centres and the impact these have on the national grid, of using sensationalist tropes, that we w…

It seems there has, in effect, been a moratorium on data centres since June 2020. I understand EirGrid approved 1,800 MW of electricity for future data centres but had applications for 2,000 MW and cancelled all that capacity. That may be a fact but we also know restrictions on data centres are applied only to new applicants. This was confirmed to us by officials from the Minister's Department at the most recent meeting of the climate committee. We have had very little time to deal with this very complex issue. He …

Does the Minister deny that this State is an outlier in respect of the percentage of generated power used by data centres compared to other states? The average across the globe is 2% to 4% of the national grid. We are looking at a situation in which 30% of the national grid could be used to feed data centres. To echo what Deputy Whitmore said, a recent report by the Irish Academy of Engineering stated that estimated data expansion will require almost €9 billion in new energy infrastructure and add at least 1.5% mil…

Over the past decade a radical active women's movement has made huge gains, forcing conservative governments here and in several Latin American countries, where historically the Catholic Church has also been dominant, finally to provide abortion rights. Now there seems to be a growing backlash against the rights women have won, with all of the misogyny around the issue following the US Supreme Court's appalling decision to reverse Roe v. Wade. This is triggering abortion bans in many US states. Of course, we know t…

I thank the Taoiseach for his views on Roe v . Wade and jurisprudence but I am more interested in what this Government is going to do to push back against any attempt to roll back abortion. I have no doubt this will embolden anti-abortionists everywhere. Aside from them, we need to know women's rights will be strengthened and not weakened by this Government. That review is hugely important, not least because the figures I gave are quite shocking. There were 770 women who had to travel when one of the reasons for in…

We know that 20,000 people were refused fuel allowance up to February and now more vulnerable people are being kicked off the scheme for being slightly over the income thresholds. Let us consider Angela who is 81 years old. She got an €8 increase from her husband's small private pension. That was enough to kick her off the fuel allowance scheme but it does not take her out of energy poverty. The bigger issue here, apart from Angela, is that the fuel allowance scheme does not capture all those in danger of energy po…

People Before Profit objects to the way in which this Bill is being pushed and rushed, to the fact that we were denied pre-legislative scrutiny of it and to the fact that it will be forced through all Stages tomorrow. It is not that that in itself is a bad precedent because it is a regular occurrence and there may be times when emergency legislation needs to be fast-tracked. We have known about this issue for some time, however, and it is clear from the briefing we received in private session from officials that ma…

The problem with the response of the Minister of State is that he said social housing has to look after the most vulnerable. We know, and it has just been outlined, that those who may be eight, ten or 12 years on the housing list and who get a small increase in their net income are taken off the housing list. This makes them very vulnerable. Many of them do end up in homelessness and they do not have any housing support. The question needs to be answered. When will the review be published? It is not satisfactory to…