I refer to the €12 increases, which will kick in in January for all social welfare rates across the board and in light of that its inadequacy, based on the minimum essential standard of living that I have raised with the Minister many times.

I wish we could see a commitment from the Government to get to the minimum essential standard of living, MESL, rather than the haggling we heard just before the budget over whether it might be €10 or €15 or might fall in the middle. We need and should be moving towards providing certainty to social welfare recipients to go to the MESL.

Households up and down the country are facing massive electricity bills this winter. October's bill will land shortly and households are already worried sick at the thought of it. We already know that people are struggling to pay their bills following never-ending hikes over the past 18 months. The facts speak for themselves. There were 715 domestic electricity disconnections in the first half of this year and that was before many of those hikes kicked in. We also know that 125,000 households are in arrears, and th…

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire. Just like the Taoiseach yesterday, when we raised the need for a ban on evictions to keep people in their homes, the Minister spent most of his response reiterating what was in the budget. Some of what is in the budget, particularly for those on fixed incomes and who rely on social welfare, is welcome. However, we are talking about householders who face disconnection. A total of 715 households have already been disconnected in the first part of this year alone, before we get to the wi…

I am sharing time with my party colleagues. One of the greatest challenges we face, as I am sure we would all agree, relates to the fact that children who need additional support are being neglected in the current system. Far too many of them are not getting the support they need when they need it and they are instead being passed from one waiting list to another. They wait for an assessment, for initial therapy and then for further therapy, and months and months pass by. It is those children and their parents who …

Public transport is still very much non-existent in many parts of rural Ireland. We are still seeing the loss of services. Last summer, the Dublin-Galway X20 bus service was taken away, which particularly impacted the likes of Aughrim and Ballinasloe in east Galway. That services are still being lost very much flies in the face of the green agenda and encouraging people to get out of their cars and take public transport. The roll-out of Connecting Ireland has been welcomed by Sinn Féin. However, only slightly more …

If this was about the industry paying the price, of course, we would not be here this evening. It is, quite frankly, naive of the Minister of State to think that this will not be passed on to people building their first homes and to those forced to rebuild their homes. I listened to the response by the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, earlier on, much of which he spent justifying why the banks and developers could not possibly be asked to pay. He said that these are the people Sinn Féin always wants to go after, never min…

Regarding the budget, certainly, “the devil is in the detail” rings a bell. One would see that when looking at the commitments around GP care. We know that commitments made previously in relation to under-12s, which has, in fact, been legislated for, has not come to fruition. There is much ambition in relation to that. It is welcome, if it can actually be implemented. In counties such as mine - I presume this is the case in many rural towns, especially - people cannot even access a GP in many cases, or else they wi…

I welcome this legislation and commend Deputy Nash and the Labour Party for bringing it forward. It is a piece of legislation that Sinn Féin will support. This Bill has a simple objective and it is something that should be done. The Government should not be slow to intervene when it comes to retirement income and the protection of income after retirement. We have seen that all too often in the past. I am reminded of the defined benefit schemes which saw employers walking away and employees left high and dry. There …

I have heard what the Taoiseach has said on the issue I raise but I am really at my wits' end in trying to get answers from Bus Éireann for parents in Roscommon and Galway regarding school transport. I acknowledge the waiving of fees. It would have been a roaring success had the capacity been put in to make it work. It would have worked very well. I have one case, for example, involving a child whose mother died last year. The mother would usually have done the application and Bus Éireann told the father that, unde…

I would appreciate if the Taoiseach would not respond with reference to the figure of 21,000. Contact is the issue.

I am asking about contact with Bus Éireann. I acknowledged the waiving of fees.

I cannot speak to anyone in Bus Éireann.

I have acknowledged the waiving of fees.

This question is fairly straightforward. It is to ask the Minister for an update on the next steps for the LEADER programme 2023 to 2027.

I, too, compliment the LEADER programme's work down through the years in constituencies throughout the State. There is no doubt it has made a real difference in communities. The Minister cited the budget and the €180 million for the four-year period, which is approximately €36 million per year. We know in the previous period of 2017 to 2020, there was a budget of €250 million, which meant approximately €55 million for what ended up being almost a four-and-a-half-year period. The Minister will know that the Irish Lo…

However, I am sure the Minister is aware of concerns that have been raised by the likes of the ILDN with regard to that budget allocation. I also want to ask the Minister about the timing for the programme. I know she has gone through the stages, and stage 1 will be launched this month. That is what has been said. Regarding the start of the LEADER programme for 2023, does the Minister have any idea when that will be? I presume, with the process that has to be gone through for the selection process, it will not be r…

This is to ask the Minister about the Croí Cónaithe scheme for towns and villages in particular. Will she outline what engagement she and her officials have had with the Minister and the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage with regard to what is a very exciting fund and scheme especially for rural towns and villages? It is very welcome. I wonder what role the Minister played with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

While I appreciate this is a joint venture and that perhaps some of my questions come under the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, perhaps the Minister could inform us regarding the eligibility criteria, population and that figure of 400. I have come across a number of cases, for example, a young lad on the road from us is in a village in a country area that does not have a population of more than 400 people. The house he has bought has been empty, definitely throughout my lifetime. He is doing i…

I thank the Minister and I too welcome the scheme. It is a good one and is needed. However, I take it from her answer local authorities do not have autonomy. It would be great if where the authorities have an allocation of X amount of money, do not spend it all and there are a few applications that are on serviced roads where the water and all that is there, they could decide to allocate it to those sites. The decisions about that would be best made by local authorities on the ground that are closer to an area. I h…