I too wish to be associated with the expressions of sympathy to the Murphy family on the senseless murder of Ashling Murphy. I support the cross-party and cross-group approach to the issue of violence against women. I will raise a separate issue with the Taoiseach. The Northern and Western Regional Assembly has just published a report on regional vacancy and dereliction, which shows that 44,905 residential and commercial properties are empty in the five Connacht counties and the three Border counties of Donegal, Ca…

There are commitments to provide funding to local authorities to support the refurbishment of vacant properties in our towns and villages, as well as to compulsorily purchase vacant properties, but these provisions - in some guise - have been available up to now but have had limited impact. Despite the publication of the Housing for All pathway to maximise the efficient use of our existing housing stock last September, the Government passed the reforms to the nursing home fair deal scheme without addressing the tre…

The whole country was stunned and shaken by the death of Ashling Murphy. I attended the vigil for Ashling at the gates of Leinster House with many members of the Oireachtas last Friday. I listened to the call by speakers for the attack on a young woman, just going for a jog on a bright winter afternoon in a rural town, to be a watershed moment in terms of all forms of violence against women. I know the death of Ashling also revisited trauma on many women across this country, as well as on the families of women who …

I refer to an issue raised in the Seanad yesterday regarding the hotels that opened in the latter half of 2019 but prior to 1 November. Hotels that opened on or after 1 November 2019 are allowed to use their pre-pandemic projections for 2021 and 2022 as the base for comparison with their actual turnover in 2021 and 2022 in establishing whether their turnover achieved the 30% reduction. Due to an anomaly within the rules, however, hotels that opened in September and October 2019 are forced to use the minuscule turno…

I move amendment No. 7: In page 13, between lines 34 and 35, to insert the following: "(c) The Minister shall, within six months of the passing of this Act, lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report on welfare measures which can support land mobility and environmental sustainability.". I flagged this amendment on Second Stage. I am using this as a vehicle to raise the issue. I hope the Minister can consider it. I accept it is not good practice to include reports in primary legislation but it is the only mech…

I thank the Minister for her comments. The late Seymour Crawford, her predecessor as Deputy for her local area, is probably looking down on us tonight and would tell her to consider this issue. The particular farmers to whom I refer are not going into these schemes. Many of them want nothing to do with paperwork. Many of them are probably not even getting their area-based payments at all. We just want to address that issue of succession in the context of land and getting it to the hands of young people. I do not wa…

I move amendment No. 8: In page 15, between lines 6 and 7, to insert the following: “(3) The Minister shall, within six months of the passing of this Act, lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report on the inclusion of all half-rate carer’s allowance recipients under the fuel allowance scheme.”. This, too, is an issue that I raised on Second Stage. I tabled the amendment on foot of the experience of a constituent of mine and Deputy Kerrane's with whom I am personally dealing at the moment. The husband of the c…

I would rather if the Minister did not, and instead amended the legislation. The reality is a small number of carers will miss out on the fuel allowance for a full 12 months because we will not have the opportunity to look at this again. I submitted this amendment in plenty of time, and I am sure the officials looked at the figures. I stand to be corrected but I suspect we are talking about a very small number who would fall into this category with no supplementary income and the only "income" is the half-rate care…

I thank the Minister.

We should have a debate on the NBP. As the Taoiseach knows, the Minister of the day was kept at arm's length from the procurement process and the Department itself was responsible for the governance of the NBP. If the review of this contract is now completed, it needs to be published. Departmental officials need to be brought before the relevant committee to answer questions on the content of that review.

In September 2000 the Government signed the optional protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography. While the Government has stated over the past 21 years that it is strongly committed to the ratification of the protocol and has enacted significant legislation to ensure Ireland is in compliance with the obligations under the protocol, the country is still not in a position to ratify it. Will the Taoiseach intervene to ensure the protocol i…

European leaders will this week discuss energy prices and resilience across the European Union. One of the ways in which they can improve resilience throughout the Union is to improve digitisation of the EU economy. To do so, they need to change what meets the definition of "high-speed broadband" at European Commission level. Today the threshold that has to be reached for high-speed broadband under EU state aid rules is just 30 Mbps. This will leave thousands of homes throughout this country with copper-wire broadb…

The just transition commissioner was appointed by the Government to facilitate dialogue and bring forward concerns from affected communities, residents, workers and businesses from right across the midlands. I am deeply disappointed that the Government does not support the continuation of the commissioner's advocacy role. Kieran Mulvey very honestly exposed the duplicity of some of the so-called support measures, ensuring that midlands families were the primary focus of all supports.

It is deeply disappointing that Kieran Mulvey or his replacement will not be appointed from the beginning of next year, particularly when the EU just transition fund will not be in place until later in the year. Kieran Mulvey has exposed weaknesses in the existing just transition fund, pointing out that communities such as Ballyforan, County Roscommon, where €1 million in investment was secured through the just transition fund, should not be overburdened in providing co-financing. We are effectively asking communit…

Kieran Mulvey, in his engagement with the ESB, pursued the company on the release of the Dalton building in Shannonbridge and the tomato shed in Lanesborough for community use. As the Minister of State will be aware, the commissioner has highlighted the fact that the tomato shed will not be released to the local community for now. The ESB is making its release dependent on it being taken off the EPA licence, and the ESB is not prepared to seek an alteration of the licence to support the community and instead is det…

In a previous reply to me, the Minister said that the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine does not categorise cattle slaughtering by quality assured or non-quality assured, track whether a bonus is paid to farmers or track the tonnage of quality-assured beef exported. As the Minister comes from Donegal, he will know from first-hand, as many of us do, that if something is not monitored it does not happen. Why does he want suckler farmers to sign up to the Bord Bia quality assurance scheme?

In an earlier response this morning, the Minister spoke about transparency in the food chain. I have asked him a very straightforward question. We all know how oral parliamentary questions are compiled. His failure to furnish that information here clearly indicates that he is not being given that information from Bord Bia. It brings into question the whole ethos behind the marketing, promotion and sale of Irish beef once it leaves this country. Clearly, quality assurance is not being prioritised by the meat plants.…

I accept the importance of providing that verification to customers. However, the Minister has been asked to provide that verification to Parliament and he cannot do that. There is something fundamentally wrong with the system if he cannot provide Parliament with the figures that he says are being provided to customers. They are being provided to customers but not to the elected representatives of every farmer throughout the country. That is fundamentally flawed. The Minister is asking suckler farmers to sign up to…

I move: That Dáil Éireann: recognises that: — Ireland has one of the largest maritime areas in the European Union (EU), seven times larger than our land mass, and covers an area of almost 500,000 sq. km, representing a 220-million-acre marine resource; — there is potential to develop over 70,000 megawatts of offshore renewable energy, providing Ireland with the opportunity to be a major exporter of green energy, powering much of Europe by 2050 via wind generated electricity and hydrogen; — while green hydrogen is i…

Standing Orders clearly state that the final ten minutes is protected so we have exactly five minutes remaining. That is under Standing Orders. It is quite clear.