The Minister's capital budget for 2020 was €20 million and it is due to go to €100 million by 2025. I would like to get a sense of the direction of travel of that investment and what kind of priorities the Minister has within the infrastructure budget for his Department and for further education generally.

I certainly welcome the level of investment. Recently I visited the Mayo College of Education Ballina campus where they are doing some really fantastic work. We also had the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, launch the new national outdoor education and training strategy at the Achill college. I congratulate Michael and all the team there. They have seen investment. Can the Minister tell me that this process is open to every ETB to apply for? In the context of hospitality, for instance, we are facing a major…

I welcome that plan. Every ETB should be encouraged to prioritise the existing strengths of each region and the educational opportunities that are available. It is important that the Minister takes an interest, as I know he will, in the Ballyhaunis project and that there is encouragement for those involved to identify and pursue opportunities. I certainly will be happy to work with him on a location in Mayo for deep energy retrofitting and the provision of the skills necessary in terms of wind farm and offshore ope…

Táim chun mo chuid ama a roinnt leis an Teachta Ó Cuív, le cead an Leas-Chathaoirligh. I welcome this debate. I welcome those who are in the Gallery, particularly the president of SIPTU, Pádraig Peyton, and Ethel Buckley. I especially welcome Mr. Peyton as he comes towards the end of his term of office. He is the one individual who has placed this issue front and centre on the political agenda. He is a Mayo man who is exiled in Sligo. He will finish his term of office at the end of this month. I have had to shorten…

Ar an ócáid seo gach bliain, deirim go bhfuil sé cosúil le coileán a cheannach ag an Nollaig. Ní don Nollaig amháin é coileán agus ní do Sheachtain na Gaeilge amháin í úsáid na Gaeilge san Oireachtas. Tá rudaí ag éirí níos fearr agus caithfidh mé buíochas a ghabháil leis na daoine i Rannóg an Aistriúcháin a thugann an-chuidiú do dhaoine an Ghaeilge a úsáid, le haistriúcháin agus le frásaí gach seachtain. Gabhaim buíochas leis na hiriseoirí a bhfuil Gaeilge acu agus a dhéanann an-iarracht cuidiú le Teachtaí agus Sea…

Last Wednesday evening we discussed this matter in somewhat academic terms. As we were doing so, President Putin was making arrangements to cross the border and invade Ukraine. As we speak, Kyiv is being bombarded with missiles. Last night, Fergal Keane, who has observed so many of these situations, finished his report with a father touching his son, who was inside a train, through the glass and on the glass. He said: "What cannot be held must be let go, until another day". That is the reality for families. They ar…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this policy. I also welcome the work of the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, and that of the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien and the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, on the co-ordination and cohesion referred to by Deputy Ó Cathasaigh. That is all very fine though at ministerial level, the difficulty is when it gets down to the ground. The ambition the Government and this House may have for town centre renewal and rural renewal is not being met on the ground. Deputy Ó C…

I, too, welcome the ambassador and her colleagues. These must be very difficult days for her, her family and her country. It is respectful and good of her to be here with us this evening. As we reflect on how we got to where we are and where we may be in the coming days, hard questions need to be asked of ourselves as a country and of the EU. Since 2015, there has been a pathway leading to where we are now. In the last few weeks, in particular, I have been struck by how relatively irrelevant the EU institutions see…

In the context of the Cabinet committee on health, as we move into the next phase of Covid-19, has the Taoiseach discussed the future role of the National Public Health Emergency Team, NPHET, and what shape and size it will be going forward? I know the Taoiseach in his previous ministerial role did a huge amount of work in the area of strokes and stroke care. He may have seen this morning the audit of strokes in Ireland, which is a really interesting piece of work highlighting the challenges facing stroke treatment…

The Taoiseach has outlined part of the role of the Secretary General. I acknowledge the service of the incumbent who I know will move on to a different position. Does the Taoiseach have any plans to review the responsibilities of the position? Will he outline the recruitment process for the new person to fulfil the role?

I know the Minister dealt with this issue earlier in response to Deputy Danny Healy-Rae, but there is a need for proactivity at this stage of the year in relation to passport supply and what is likely to be a very large demand for passports and passport renewals this year. That proactivity might save an awful lot of trouble for many people down the line.

First, on the expanded office space, I have made the point previously that we need a physical passport office in the west. It is unfair for me to have to get somebody to travel to Dublin late on a Friday evening to collect a passport, as I had to do again last Friday. Surely in the context of new office space, that should be considered. We need an office somewhere central in the region. Second, I thank the people in the unit. They have been incredibly helpful but they are under huge pressure. However, in anticipati…

On the advertising campaign, the lotto campaign says it could be you, but when it comes to passports, it never is you until it actually happens. People probably laugh about this until they have done it themselves. I am sure it has happened to all of us. If, when you book and you are putting in your card details, there was a prompt that said "Is your passport in date?", that would do it. We need turnaround times people can see that are actually real. Again, I ask the Minister to consider a passport centre in the wes…

I am rapidly losing confidence in the roll-out of the national broadband plan. My concerns are slightly more micro than the business model. There is a community in east Mayo that is very entrepreneurial but also has many families living in it. Within this community there are three home-grown companies that export internationally. We have been working with NBI for some time to try to get a sense of when a fibre connection will go into these companies and into the community. This community recently lost all its banki…

I welcome the Bill and the opportunity to speak on it. The Bill's Title, the Regulation of Providers of Building Works Bill, does not give us a sense of the importance of it. Deputy Martin Kenny has just touched on an issue on which I will also speak. It gives us the sense, and the Acting Chair knows this from his constituency, that when building works go bad and there is no regulation the extent and level of human misery and human distress is unbelievable. I do not think any Bill or legislation can do anything to …

I would like the Minister of State’s views on the common bond for credit unions. Has the Government any plans in this space? We also might have an opportunity to discuss the work that the Minister of State is doing on credit unions. He is putting significant work into this. In yesterday's update from the Central Bank of Ireland, the ambition and the hunger of the credit union sector was not reflected or acknowledged in the language it used.

I thank the Minister of State. I would like some detail on that review process and its timeline. Will that happen in the first quarter of next year? Will the recommendations the Minister of State is hoping to bring require legislative change? If so, do we have any sense of a timeline on that? A number of us met with credit union representatives a few weeks ago and the Minister of State was on that call. There was a sense of ambition from them, a sense of wanting to respond to the various challenges facing communiti…

Those recommendations make complete sense. The Minister used the word "promptly". Those recommendations were made in 2017 and we are now in 2021. Will the new proposals mirror some of those recommendations? Where did that resistance come from?

I acknowledge the Minister of State's work and assistance in this area. However, Deputy Ó Cuív is right. We have gone the full circle. There are families and people across the country for whom we could not get home help hours for a long time because the resources were not available. Now the hours are available, but we do not have the people. Families are being left in appalling situations. Loved ones are being left in hospitals, unable to leave, because we cannot get home care workers. They are available internatio…

I am inquiring about the status of the regional enterprise plans, many of which were completed in 2020. Can I get an update on them, particularly in the context of Brexit but also in the context of the Covid pandemic, and the benefits there have been for regional enterprise?