For many people, there is a personal crisis and a family crisis. I know the debates have to go on at European Union level, but we have to inject some degree of certainty about the timeline. Are we talking about next October or before then? The Taoiseach talks about an inclusive process with social partners and stakeholders. What does that mean? We increasingly see people who are at breaking point. The Taoiseach must see them himself. Their budgets do not stretch to providing a roof over their head, food and energy.…

We have taken in a lot.

It is quite rare to see prosecutions around corrupt practices arising from lengthy tribunals of inquiry or commissions of investigation, even where there are negative findings. The Moriarty tribunal is a case in point. It has gone back and forth between the Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP, and the Garda Síochána since it reported in 2011. There are alternatives to tribunals of inquiry. We need to get to that point where we have a satisfactory means of dealing with issues that require inquiry. Commissions of in…

We are all affected and appalled by the images we are seeing in Ukraine. On the sanctions that are already in place, almost half of the 33 Irish special purpose vehicles, SPVs, used by Russian banks and companies are subject to the current sanctions and about €35 billion is involved, a lot of which washes through. The professional firms that manage the SPVs are obliged to freeze the sanctioned assets but the Central Bank does not regulate them. What initiatives are being put in place to identify the true owners in …

The renters out there who are fearful that they will never be able to afford their own homes need not worry. The Government has a plan to auto-enrol them in a pension so that they can raid the pension fund to continue to pay rack rents when they reach their mid-60s. According to the Irish Independent , a confidential Cabinet memo stated that the new auto-enrolment pension scheme is "particularly important" because "an increasing number of older people will need sufficient income to meet rental costs during their re…

Auto-enrolment, of course, is something that is to be welcomed and, in fact, I said in my contribution which the Taoiseach must have missed. However, it was also reported in the Irish Independent that a confidential Cabinet memorandum stated that the new auto-enrolment pension scheme is particularly important because an increasing number of older people will need sufficient income to meet rental costs during their retirement years. Can the Taoiseach confirm that this is the purpose? This matters. Currently, there i…

It was not numbers that delivered affordability. In fact, the crash reduced house prices. Affordability is something deliberate and I do not see that in the Government's plans. There is no evidence of it.

Affordable.

You have been saying the same thing for ten years.

I thank Deputy Cian O'Callaghan for bringing this Bill forward. It is difficult to know what to say on this issue. It is difficult to sum up how abhorrent it is for anyone to prey on vulnerable women and to leverage shelter for sex. This issue has come to the forefront in recent weeks, primarily due to the tireless reporting by Ann Murphy in the Irish Examiner , as well as the arrival of more than 10,000 Ukrainians who are in desperate need of accommodation in an environment where there is already a chronic housing…

The Social Democrats will support the Bill, which is largely technical in nature. It amends aspects of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003 to ensure compliance with the 2002 framework decision on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between the member states. As others have noted, every few weeks we come to the House and talk about our need to do better on transposing European directives and framework decisions. I have lost count of how many times I have stood here and debated legislation which…

I thank the Labour Party for introducing this motion. I am aware it had intended to bring a particular Bill through to Committee Stage during its Private Members' time. I have worked on similar legislation. Bill Browder came over and met parliamentarians to try to get a Magnitsky Act concluded here. I share the Labour Party's frustration. I have equally found the process a very frustrating experience. There is no doubt that there is a requirement for a money message, but there is goodwill across the House to get a …

Hate speech and hate crime really have a ripple effect. The fear and anxiety caused by crimes resonate through communities and through generations. Targeting people on the basis of their identity sends a message to every other person in that community that they are not safe and they do not belong. It undermines the core values we strive for in society of equality, diversity and inclusion, and it undermines the fundamental right of everyone to be treated with dignity and respect. I welcome the decision of the EU to …

I thank the Independent group for putting forward this motion. We have been debating the use of the PSC in this House for years. We have been arguing about when it can be used, how it can be used and what kind of data it can contain. I again make the same point I have made repeatedly over the past number of years. If the Government wants a national identification card, it should admit it, produce legislation, get legal advice, come into this Chamber and let us debate it, but it should not do it by stealth, which is…

What we are witnessing in Ukraine is a rapidly unfolding human rights and humanitarian disaster. Yesterday, the Russians used cluster bombs in a densely-populated civilian neighbourhood of Kharkiv. This kind of indiscriminate attack is clearly designed to maximise civilian casualties. I know the Taoiseach will agree with me that this is the definition of a war crime. Today, a military convoy extends for 60 km and inches its way closer to Kyiv. It is clear Kyiv will soon be under siege with massive invading armies s…

It is really important that we play our full part in those sanctions. With regard to the limited partnerships, it has been demonstrated that a Russian company previously subjected to the sanctions in 2014 was able to overcome them by having a registered company in Ireland. It will be really important that if there are loopholes to be closed and legislation to be produced in that regard, it needs to be done as a matter of urgency. We do not want to look back in retrospect and see that there was a way around this. I …

I am also greatly disappointed with what we are being asked to vote on tonight. It is hard to believe that we are an island nation, because it would have been thought that this would have been one of the things we would have got right. It was not that long ago that we had a debate here on the loss of marine helicopter R116. That report was clear about its intention. It set out not to apportion blame, but to learn lessons and to save lives in future. Every investigation should be about that. Much of this context pre…

Whenever there are scandals in the public service the inevitable review concludes it is down to a "system failure". It is a loaded term and suggests there is some kind of automated process that has gone awry in some way and there is no need to hold an individual or, indeed, an entity responsible. A succession of scandals in the health service have been in the news in recent weeks. Just yesterday, we learned of a further scandal in disability services in the north west. A resident was able to access child exploitati…

The Taoiseach's very first line that he does not know what it is I am proposing concerns me. I am proposing that we build accountability into the system. There has been a myriad of different reports. When harm has been done, the first response tends to be about financial compensation, which is appropriate, but very often whistleblowers and people who have been harmed want more than that. They want to be sure that the same people who have failed in their positions of responsibility will be held personally responsibl…

Low pay is not a recent problem. It has been an issue for decades. It is a feature, unfortunately, of the Irish economy. We have the highest levels of low pay in the EU. It has a real impact on people's lives but it is having an especially big impact now as prices are rising so dramatically. This is not something that just arose as a consequence of the pandemic. Front-line workers during the pandemic were people who went into work, gowned up and put themselves at risk in hospitals, nursing homes etc., but people al…