I thought I was finished yesterday, but I am glad to be here this morning. I thank the Minister of State for being here. The various grants the Government has made available to support small businesses are extraordinarily welcome and very important. The increased cost of business grant and the power up grant are the two most recent ones. In every scheme, anomalies will always arise. A number of anomalies has arisen here, which I want to draw attention to this morning, and that I ask the Minister of State and the De…

I thank the Minister of State for his response. I understand exactly what is being said here, but I will quote to the Minister of State from the frequently asked questions on the Department website. Under the question "What is the eligibility for the grant?" the response states that: "Your business must be a commercially trading entity currently operating from a property that is commercial rateable." It does not say that the business owner has to be paying the rates. The rates are being paid. I understand the crite…

This is my last time speaking here. I thank everybody, including the staff, the Ceann Comhairle and everyone else in the House for their courtesy and professionalism over the past 27 years. I also wish everyone well into the future. Finally, I suggest to the Taoiseach that with all the other great work that has been done over the years, he might consider establishing a fund in order that communities can purchase land to build community centres, sports tracks, swimming pools and so on, which would help communities i…

The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment administers some very good grants, of which the power up grant is one. I support Deputy Canney who spoke about anomalies in the system. There is one in particular where if the business is a tenant and pays the rates to the landlord to pass on to the local authority, nobody can qualify for the grant. In addition, if people had already registered under the increased cost-of-business grant and made a mistake, they cannot rectify that. The algorithms will not allow it …

I am sure the Taoiseach will agree with me that we need many more treatment centres for people suffering from addiction to alcohol, drugs and gambling. Tabor Lodge in Cork is under severe financial pressure and I am worried it might have to close. It is one such centre. We need many more of them. Will the Government act to ensure it does not close?

Local authorities can identify houses that are derelict and go down the compulsory purchase order, CPO, route. Does the Minister have any indication of how many houses might be eligible for the vacant property grant? Is there any link between what the local authorities are doing in identifying vacant properties and the vacant property tax, which might act as an incentive for people to avail of the grant and bring properties back into use?

This question relates to the possible need to introduce national guidelines to manage the development of large-scale solar farms. In my part of the country, we are seeing hundreds of acres being earmarked for solar farms. As the Tánaiste stated last week, we are talking about 40 shades of green turning into 40 shades of grey.

I thank the Minister of State for his response, but I put it to him that the development of large-scale - I am talking about hundreds of acres - solar farms is very new. While we have national guidelines on the production of renewable energy that seem to dictate planning guidelines, there are no guidelines on large-scale solar farms. This involves the transformation of whole townlands and tracts of land. As far as the eye can see they are turning grey. Is it not about time the Government went beyond reviewing this …

Does the Minister of State agree a convenient grid connection will lead to many applications for solar farms at a particular location? As a result of that, a whole region could be converted into a super solar farm. Does the Minister of State agree there should be guidelines in place nationally to ensure this does not happen? If you live in an area with nothing but grey glass as far as the eye can see, surely that is not desirable, particularly when there are so many roofs of farm and community buildings all over th…

I ask the Tánaiste to comment on the situation regarding the Reserve Defence Force. In most other jurisdictions, reserve defence forces take a very prominent role and, in some instances, are far larger than the permanent defence forces, and they are used in a very proactive way by the jurisdictions they are located in. I am concerned about the future of the RDF here and I would like to know what the plans are.

I thank the Tánaiste for that comprehensive response. I hope the number will increase. I understand there was a time when the number in the RDF, formerly the FCA, was approximately 20,000. That was the situation when I was a member up to 1997, before I came in here and was told my services were no longer required. Will the Tánaiste comment on the situation regarding the tax-free gratuity, which played an important part in attracting and retaining members to the Reserve in the past? Will he also comment on what can …

I agree with the Tánaiste about engagement with employers. As many employers would value the training I and others got in the Defence Forces in the past, I encourage the Tánaiste to go down that road and work on that. The Tánaiste may not have the information with him today but could he let me know about the thinking about the tax-free gratuity that used to be paid? I think the Commission on the Defence Forces said it should be reinstated. A payment was made that was linked to the number of hours of training a pers…

I have raised this issue on a number of occasions. Since 2016, a boil water notice has been in place in west Cork, affecting 9,000 customers. To buy bottled water costs between €500 and €1,000 per annum per household, when water should be free. It will be another two years before this issue will be resolved. I understand the UK is introducing a compensation scheme when this happens. The Minister, Deputy O'Brien, recently told me that he is considering such a scheme in this jurisdiction. Can the Minister report on f…

I thank the Ceann Comhairle's office for selecting this issue and the Minister for being present to address the matter. On 27 June, the Minister will recall that I raised during Question Time the issue of publicity post at An Post and the way it was being administered. The Leas-Cheann Comhairle may be aware that there are many zones around the country, but I suspect they were constructed decades ago. They do not make any sense, they are large and arbitrary, they cross county bounds and they cannot be targeted. In J…

I thank the Minister for his response and his candidness. I think he is getting the same response I got. "None of your business," is what they say, in so many words. They are getting a lot of money. An Post is a great organisation and I agree it is doing great things. It has done great things with e-cards and so on and was marvellous during Covid. This, however, is the one area I think it may not be interested in. It was probably devised during the time of the stagecoaches. If the Minister looks at the maps to see …

I thank the Ceann Comhairle's office for selecting this Topical Issue and thank the Minister of State for being here this morning. She is working overtime and should get an increase in wages, she is doing so many Topical Issues for everybody else. I also acknowledge Deputy O'Connor. Both of us are Government TDs from the same constituency and raise the same issue. I do not know if anybody takes any notice out there any more in Government Departments of what happens in this Chamber. In any event, I will have probabl…

I thank the Minister of State for her response. Again, as she commented, this response is a cut-and-paste of what I have heard many times. I am sure my colleague here has heard it many times too. What is interesting here are the safety measures on the N25 between Carrigtwohill and Midleton, which is an extraordinarily dangerous and busy section of road. There is an intention to apply for planning permission in this regard during 2025. That could be in December 2025 and we might not see any works happening until 202…

The urban regeneration and development fund has been a great game-changer, with €1.9 billion allocated to it so far. I was told last May that another round is due before the end of this year. Is that still the case and if so when will it happen?

How is the Minister of State ensuring third-level institutions and universities are supplied with the most up-to-date, cutting edge technological and research equipment? How is he supporting them in that regard?

I thank the Minister of State for telling us about the good work that is going on and the money being made available. Does he accept the finding by the Irish Universities Association in an investigation it launched recently that one third of the equipment in Irish universities is older than the original iPhone, that is, more than 16 years old, and more than half of it is over a decade old? Does he agree that this limits universities' ability to compete at the leading edge in domains of research that rely on such eq…