That is fair enough as an answer but it does not get to the point I am making, which is that the Bill the Minister published had an over-reliance on negative emissions technology. That is a sort of dream into the future because when one unpicks the models of negative emissions technologies, NETs, and a large-scale deployment of them, if it was possible, in the words of the scientist, Kevin Anderson, it is taking a high-stakes gamble in the hope that such technology can be invented in time and on scale but the probl…

I admire the Minister's optimism but as we know the reality is that for decades carbon capture and storage has been proposed as the silver bullet solution for cutting carbon emissions. Despite billions of dollars in funding and years of research there are no carbon capture storage, CSS, plants anywhere in the world that effectively capture and store carbon. Relying on a hope that it will do so in the future is a fundamental mistake. My question to the Minister is whether his refined and changed Bill that he is abou…

I listened to the Minister's speech the last time we discussed the Bill. I congratulate him and his speechwriter as it was a very fine speech indeed, full of high-flying rhetoric, full of absolutely correct observations about the housing crisis and the importance of housing as a basic necessity of life. It stated: ...the State has to step up to the mark to provide affordable homes for purchase and rent using all the means at its disposal. A good home ... should be the launch pad for life's adventures and a refuge f…

I have some observations on the specifics of the Bill. At one point, it states we need to counteract undue segregation in housing between persons of different social backgrounds. On the one hand, to any outsider, it would seem a laudable objective. Who wants segregation? In reality, however, for more than two decades I have heard this time and again, and each time the purpose of anti-segregation policy is not talking about the need to ensure people on lower incomes, from the Travelling community or from ethnic mino…

Before the debate adjourned, I spoke about the question of cost-rental. Many Members who spoke before me pointed out the significant gaps in this Bill as well as the dangers inherited from the gutting of local democracy to the huge reliance on the private market to deliver. In addition to that, I want to highlight one section which alarms me. It is typical of the gap between the Minister's rhetoric and what is actually in the Bill. I am sure he will clarify it later. Section 55, on the disposal of land by the agenc…

It is co-living, okay. The Minister gave them notice that there was a month to call this off, and within that month, there were eight new applications for co-living. I reference it because it is a significant problem in my constituency. The residents in the area of the Player Wills development, which takes in Player Wills and other sites around it, are themselves having to pay for a judicial review of the strategic housing development because more than half of the 490 units will be for co-living and high-rise will …

It is worth reminding ourselves that International Women's Day, 8 March, grew out of the labour movement, the workers' movement, when thousands of women in New York in the early part of the 20th century - 1908, in fact - marched through the city demanding a shorter working week, better pay and the right to vote. The tradition continued right up until the Russian Revolution, when in the same period the women of Russia took strike action for bread and peace in the middle of the First World War. That strike forced the…

I am sure like the rest of us the Taoiseach remembers Phil Hogan, who long before he went to Europe and long before "golfgate", was in charge of water services. At the time, as well as threatening the population that he would turn their water down to a trickle if they did not pay water charges, he also did a deal with all 3,200 of those who worked in the water services so that they would co-operate with the establishment of Irish Water by working to a service level agreement, SLA, that was legally binding until 202…

I wish to respond to the Taoiseach on a number of issues. I understand there is a statement in the programme for Government to guarantee that water will remain as a public utility, but in fact a creeping privatisation is taking place by the outsourcing of functions. Irish Water declared it would begin a programme of replacing lead pipes, but it outsourced it. It declared it would undertake a programme to push up the water pressure in some areas, and it outsourced it. The workers employed by the councils are the key…

Ag ócáidí mar seo is minic go mbíonn daoine ag labhairt faoin Ghaeilge ar nós nach bhfuil ann ach caitheamh aimsire, mar theanga nach labhraíonn muid ach ó am go ham, nó mar atáimid ag déanamh anois le linn Sheachtain na Gaeilge. Is mian liom labhairt, áfach, faoi thábhacht na Gaeilge ó thaobh chultúr agus stair na tíre, mar a bhaineann sí leis an am atá le teacht agus faoin mbealach gur féidir linn an Ghaeilge a úsáid chun cur lenár saol agus leis an tuiscint atá againn orainn féin mar phobal. Is le gach duine an …

I am going to try to take four and a half minutes back and forth with the Minister and ensure I leave two minutes for Deputy Mick Barry. The return to school has been a double-edged sword for our society. On the one hand, there is the sense of joy and relief for children, their parents and teachers about going back but on the other, there is trepidation and fear. That is because we still have a high rate of Covid-19 infection in the community and these things are linked; they are not separate. We therefore need to …

I have just finished a phone call with a constituent in Ballyfermot. I am not sure if the Minister is aware of the following, but it will be interesting to hear if he is. At least 90 people over 85 years of age have had their vaccination appointments for today and tomorrow cancelled. The Ballyfermot primary healthcare centre was emptied of all other appointments to allow that to happen. The vaccines never arrived, leaving these people very disappointed, worried and anxious and an entire community up in arms about h…

I will be sharing time. I thank the Social Democrats for tabling the motion. I will start by talking about something that came to my attention last weekend. The building used by the mother and baby homes commission for its work has a granite plaque outside it with a small seabird known as the turnstone carved into it. The turnstone pokes its beak down and overturns stones, hence the name. The point of the plaque being there is that the building was once used as the headquarters of the Health Research Board and at t…

A year on, the New Decade, New Approach deal speaks volumes about what was originally in it. Other Deputies have referred to the fact that many of the proposals in the deal have been aspirational without any effort to include proper figures for spending, giving a real cause for concern. Behind the headlines, however, repeated references to the need for rationalisation and efficiency reviews, which is political speak for austerity and job losses, proposals to deal with a further reform of the Northern Ireland Civil …

I want to take up a question that the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, Deputy Connolly, raised yesterday, namely, the question of the destruction of the files from the commission on mother and baby homes. I am sure the Tánaiste and everybody else in the House is aware of this because everybody will have received emails about it from the survivors and their representatives. I am making a plea to the Tánaiste, in his capacity as a representative of the Government, to find a way to do something to extend the lifetime of the com…

I will not comment on what I think of the report of the commission of investigation into mother and baby homes, whether it is good or bad or what the problems with it are. That is not what I am here today to try to do. I am here to best represent the interests of the survivors who have been pleading with all of us. I doubt there is a Deputy in the House or a Senator in the other House who has not received tons of emails asking us to do our best to ensure the allegedly destroyed files are not destroyed. It is not al…

There seems to be a push to get all the kids back to school and it is understandable that people want that. It was said in yesterday's Irish Independent that it has figures that show that the cohort of people next most susceptible to Covid during the third wave are young people, from ages 16 to 18, and so reopening the schools has huge implications. Has the Government ensured that the work was done to make our schools safe? I mention the size of the classrooms. Have we acquired more spaces so that children and youn…

Approximately ten months ago, I first raised the issue of meat plants and Covid outbreaks with one of the Minister's predecessors, whose response was an angry defence of the industry and the meat plants. That was a foolish response and, at worst, negligence because as we all now know meat plants are epicentres of Covid infection, often leaving vulnerable migrant workers at risk and the communities wherein they are located at risk. I continue to find bizarre the responses from every arm of the State in relation to t…

I heard the Tánaiste tell Deputy Michael Collins that he does not know much about Barryroe, but he is probably aware that the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, recently granted approval for survey works to continue or begin at Barryroe. I am not being smart, but I want to tell the Tánaiste and Deputy Michael Collins that since the Green Party entered Government, the science has not changed. The science around climate has not changed. We still need to leave 80% of gas reser…

I move: That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to amend and extend certain rights and protections of retired persons and certain representative associations in relation to industrial relations and trade disputes and for that purpose to amend the Trade Union Acts 1871 to 1990 and the Industrial Relations Acts 1946 to 2019, to make provision for enhanced representation of retired workers in relation to the administration of certain pension schemes, to amend the Pensions Act 1990 and to provide for …