The Minister may have read in the Irish Independent this week that the remains of a body found in Galway in 1995 went missing from a HSE mortuary. There are 51 sets of unidentified remains on the Government database. In three of those cases, the remains or parts of the remains have gone missing. These include a skull found in north County Dublin in 2006 and partial remains found in Wexford in 1995. It is hoped that modern technology will allow these remains to be matched with missing people, allowing them to be ide…

I find it incredible that we do not have a commitment for a debate with both the former and current Ministers for justice about the ramifications of the whistleblower documentary last week. The budget will not distract us from seeking this debate. We are objecting this week. We will object next week. We will object every week until the debate happens.

The Labour Party and I want to raise with the Minister the compounding crisis year on year for school transport. It is impacting every constituency. I represent a largely urban constituency, yet I am dealing with ten families in Swords who are unable to get school transport up to Coláiste Ghlór na Mara in Balbriggan. This is happening every single year; kids are being left at the side of the road. My party colleague Deputy Wall is dealing with over 100 families across four routes in Kildare South and Deputy Eoghan …

I thank Minister of State, Deputy Harkin, for taking this debate late on a Thursday evening, on the last sitting day of this term. I would like to talk about the town of Swords in north County Dublin. It is the third largest town by population in Ireland, but it is still treated culturally like a small village with a few airport workers in it. I am not sure how familiar the Minister of State is with Swords, but it is absolutely massive and is undergoing huge change. There is a massive amount of housing being built …

I thank the Minister of State for her response, which speaks to the issue I am raising. Again, she will sense the tone in which I am raising it. There is an awful lot happening and being built, but it is the co-ordination of these works that is the problem. If I could take just three examples from the Minister of State's response, we have the Sword's cultural quarter which is closed at the Seatown Road. That is one project. The Seatown Road is connected to the R132, which is an old dual carriageway that is down to …

I welcome to the Gallery former councillor Peter Coyle, a great servant to the Labour Party and Fingal local government for 20 years. I thank Deputy Kenny for bringing forward this motion on behalf of the Labour Party and the majority of Deputies for their contributions to this debate today. I have to qualify that thanks as a couple of the Sinn Féin contributors chose to take a narrow, decontextualised view of Labour’s own record in education. To focus that lens on Sinn Féin, which held the education brief in North…

You have had your moment. We have put this motion down in July 2026, at a time of relative plenty. While over the past number of years things have been brought in to attempt to relieve the burden on parents and families in relation to school costs, this Government has continued, almost by stealth, to squeeze families in relation to the cost of education. State examination fees continue to go up. School transport fees continue to go up under this Government. The cost of ancillary services, energy, insurance and wast…

I raise the lack of ASD classes in my constituency in Fingal, the youngest and fastest growing area of the country. Towns like Swords, Donabate and Portmarnock have ASD classes at primary school level, albeit they are vastly oversubscribed and there are huge waiting lists, but in Malahide there are no ASD classes in any of the primary schools. When Sam’s dad emails my office asking where his son is going to be able to go to school to get an education in an ASD class, I have no answer for him because there are no cl…

The summer programme, previously known as July provision, remains in absolute chaos. We have parents and children still wondering whether they are going to get a service this summer. We have an email address and a phone number but we do not have answers. We would like a debate in this House at the earliest possible opportunity.

We had a good discussion about this on Committee Stage. It is important to note on the floor of the Dáil that we would be an outlier in terms of this legislation compared with other countries that have progressed similar or related legislation. When Senator Frances Black started this process eight years ago, Ireland was a pioneer in introducing legislation in this area. We have since been caught up and overtaken by other European countries, such as Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium and Norway. They have combined the …

To continue on from where we were left off at committee, by taking services out of the original Bill, we are essentially gutting it and watering it down. It is not just politicians on this side of the House saying that. Oxfam Ireland and a slew of very respected worldwide international organisations will say that this Bill has been watered down. Services make up 70% of the overall trade with the occupied territories. That trade, including financial services, tourism, tech and booking platforms, is a huge boon to th…

This is a welcome Bill and our thanks go to Sinn Féin for bringing it forward for discussion. It is not just a timely opportunity for the House to discuss the fundamental issue of Irish unity, but a chance for us and the Government to finally get serious on the important work of preparing for constitutional change. It has been clear for some years that not moving forward with urgency just will not cut it. There is a job of work to be done and this Bill sets out a path for beginning to get that work under way. A Gre…

We are debating Committee Stage amendments to the occupied territories Bill this evening. There could also be another committee meeting on Thursday morning to continue discussion on the Bill. However, the deadline for Report Stage amendments is tomorrow, Wednesday. I ask that the deadline for Report Stage amendments be moved to late Thursday or Friday if Committee Stage goes to Thursday, so that everything is in order and we are not rushing this Bill any more than it is already being rushed.

Last week the Minister accused the Labour Party and, by implication, myself of being anti-Dublin Airport and anti-growth. He knows me and the Labour Party better than that. This is a far more complex issue than he purports or presents it to be. I know where I stand on the airport, and my record stands up in terms of representing airport workers at all grades and all levels through the Covid pandemic and all the other difficulties. I want the airport to thrive but not at any cost. The values of the Labour Party, in …

I welcome this opportunity to speak on rare diseases. I spoke on the issue in the previous Dáil. I do not think I have spoken about it in the current Dáil. It has been said many times that, although rare diseases are classified as rare, we all probably know somebody who has one because one in 17 people in the country, a total of 300,000 people, have a rare disease. It is a very difficult issue to talk about. The system to approve medicines in this country has been poor. It has resulted in medicines that are availab…

This Government is going backwards with climate change. I commend Deputy Ahern on this motion and his commitment to bringing home to all the people of Ireland the impact that data centres are having not only on our climate but also on their household bills and the cost-of-living crisis. The UN has referenced us as a cautionary tale. Yet, does Ireland listen? No. When the tech bros call, this Irish Government jumps and asks, “How high?” Its amendment to the motion is absolutely embarrassing. It opens with the point …

I just want to say that the Member did not speak to our motion.

I want to raise school places in my constituency, specifically in Portmarnock. It is two months to the day since I stood in this Chamber and requested an urgent meeting with the Minister for Education and Youth on the severe deficit of school places in Portmarnock. I have had no official response to that meeting request and I have followed up with the Department a number of times. It is not good enough. It is not what the parents and the children deserve. The parliamentary questions I have tabled are getting the sa…

It is long overdue for the Government to enact some changes to ensure that the implementation and enforcement of relevant Department circulars is put on a statutory footing. In doing so, the Bill takes some steps that are tentatively welcome but significant concerns remain that the legislation may make it increasingly difficult for those who should be entitled to access social housing to do so by increasing and complicating the criteria they have to meet. The Bill suggests an unreality in which the existing situati…

I acknowledge the presence and work of Senator Frances Black. It requires some degree of fortitude to deliver a Bill from the Opposition or as Independents in the Seanad and to see it through to this point, eight years later, in the Dáil. I offer my heartfelt commendation to the Senator on getting the Bill this far, although it is clear that this is not the Bill she wrote. She is, however, the impetus and the source behind it. I also acknowledge to the Minister that two Thursdays ago in the Dáil, I accused her of m…