I wish both Ministers of State well in their new jobs. County Kerry has its fair share of mental health problems. We all know what happened with south Kerry CAMHS when 250 children were badly wronged, mistreated and badly let down. Not much has changed since then in south Kerry. Families are left to their own devices to try to mind their children around the clock. Some people cannot go to work because they have to stay with their children. There seems to be no way out. There is a waiting list of two years in some c…

I hope this new programme for Government delivers for County Kerry because Kerry definitely has been left behind for a lot of years now. Even Killarney is in a desperate state. It needs a bypass first of all but in the short term daily traffic is going into Killarney from every side, meaning that people are now avoiding it. That is detrimental to tourist providers and to business in the town and we need to do something in the interim to ensure the traffic is freed up in Killarney. We have over 660 other roads on th…

This Government-generated pressure from strict planning is the cause of it. I want to mention treatment plants. Every one of them is not capable. We cannot build even one house in some of our towns and villages.

What will the Government do about section 39 workers, who have been left behind for so long, regarding pay parity and conditions? They are about to strike shortly. They are calling for industrial action and I feel they have no choice but to do that because they have been promised for so long. These section 39 workers do Trojan work in Kerry around people with disabilities and all the other little problems they have. They do the very same work as section 38 workers but are not paid the same. It is not fair that two …

I thank the people of Kerry for sending me up here again for a third time. I thank each and every one of them. They all know who we are, my family and all the people who work for me. I thank them all so much for depending on me and sending me up here again to talk for the people of Kerry and to represent Kerry, and I thank them for electing Michael, my brother. A Chathaoirligh, do not tell them I am here at all. There are a lot of people trying to stop me talking. Do not let on that I am here at all but I will stay…

-----up at Cordal and called on all those places. They were still there inside-----

Thank you very much, a Chathaoirligh, but my time was eaten into-----

All right. Thanks very much.

I hope they do not find out I am here; they might stop me talking. It is very important to debate this issue here tonight. Many people in Kerry have been perished from the cold when the houses that were basically heated by electricity lost power. Can the Minister of State imagine young families trying to heat a bottle for babies? Simple things became an awful ordeal. Water pumps did not work because of the electricity being out. In times gone by it would not have been so bad because people could boil the kettle of …

I thank the Minister of State for the reply. I join him in thanking all the emergency services and all the people who went out in the dark and wet, night and day, trying to get the electricity going again and all the people in the health services, especially those who visited old people - home helps, etc. - for all the great work they did. The Minister of State said there are no regulations preventing stoves being put in to new houses. To get a loan and to achieve the BER rating that the banks demand, whatever busi…

The Department is asking the local authority to take out the chimneys.

They are not doing it off their own bat, surely.

Will the Minister of State tell us why it is happening in Kilgarvan so, and why they could not find that out-----

My questions have not been answered.

Ye voted for the carbon tax.

I congratulate Deputy Verona Murphy on being elevated to the high office of Ceann Comhairle and wish her well. I thank the outgoing Ceann Comhairle, Deputy Seán Ó Fearghaíl, for his dedication and the fair play he afforded to everyone in this Chamber, because he did. We will remember him. He changed many things that applied under previous Cinn Chomhairle for the better. I thank the people of Kerry who entrusted me and elected me for a third time to represent them. My focus will be on Kerry and the people of Kerry d…

What about the second bicycle shelter?

I will not start on you.

I welcome to Dáil Éireann almost 30 retired nurses who devoted their lives to working in hospitals and caring for the sick, and I commend them on the service they gave. I remind the Taoiseach that these are the very people who came back to help during the Covid period, in 2021 and 2022. The Government is now taking and demanding money out of their pensions. The Government is abating the pensions of these very people, by €2,700, €5,000 and €25,000 for a man who had a high dependency job. These are the people the Gov…

-----and what the Taoiseach is presiding over. No matter how much they try to disentangle from each other, Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Green Party are one crowd. They might as well rename themselves and get a new party because that is what they are. The Taoiseach does not want to take on the Greens because they get ministerial posts and the posts of Taoiseach and Tánaiste for themselves. That is what they are doing.