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When the Government announced the AI strategy in February, there was a very long press release, but it did not mention the word “jobs”. I want to raise a specific case in my constituency. Covalen made 720 workers redundant, and it blamed 540 of those lay-offs on AI. The company works for Meta. A total of 540 workers were under the two-year mark for statutory severance payments and they also have a six-month cooling off period. The company has refused to meet with their union, even though 30% of the workforce are me…

The Minister drives from Mullingar most weeks when he comes to Dublin 2, which is in my constituency. He might have noticed the state of the roads in Dublin city. They are in a huge state of disrepair. It is problematic for many residents. The Minister must imagine my surprise when I received an email this week stating that the area engineer for this area does not have any budget remaining for the remainder of 2026 for road surfacing and footpath reconstruction. Did the Government knowingly underfund Dublin City Co…

On the eve of the World Cup, it is worth remembering the immense potential for good that sport, and particular football, can have in the world. Much of what we will see in the coming weeks will be the global community coming together to cheer on their teams in the spirit of friendly competition and comradery. While the power of sport can be used for good, the same power can be usurped and used to obfuscate and distract from great wrong, from corruption and abuse, and even from the greatest crimes against humanity. …

A short drive from here is the Poolbeg area. The Irish Glass Bottle site is expected to have about 10,000 residents at peak when it is completed but there is a major traffic congestion problem. If the Taoiseach tried to go there this afternoon, he would experience it. We are waiting on the Poolbeg Luas. There was a report saying it could be delivered by 2030 and I want to understand why it will not be. Why is it not in the national development plan? What will the Government do to accelerate infrastructure in this a…

That would be an update. It is not in the national development plan, NDP.

The moniker for the Fianna Fáil Party is the Republican Party. What is the Taoiseach's plan to end partition? There is a huge set of tricky issues here. How do we integrate a health service? How do we think about housing? Property prices are about a half or third in Northern Ireland. How do we think about public transport? How do we think about constitutional changes? It does not seem like there is any planning happening in the Taoiseach's Department. That is a real challenge for many people who believe that should…

I start by thanking Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion. It is very important and I am very glad that it did. Here we go again. We are back here again, several months after I introduced a motion calling for an emergency winter payment for people with disabilities. I am a new TD. I like to listen to what is happening around here. One of the first debates I saw was a three-hour debate on disabilities. It came from all sides of the House. Everybody was talking about how it was very difficult for families who ha…

Over the past number of weeks, Meta and Covalen have announced redundancies totalling over 1,000 job losses here in Dublin. This comes on the back of a severe stalling in graduate hiring in Ireland, leaving many young people without an economic future, as if it was not hard enough under this Government. I have been speaking with many young tech workers in my constituency who are deeply afraid that the artificial intelligence, AI, bubble is bursting and they will be left with nowhere to go. I have to say that as the…

Mere words, Minister.

I am proud today to support my party leader, Deputy Holly Cairns, in this Bill to implement much-needed changes to legislation governing terminations of pregnancies. There is a worthwhile history lesson we should remember in this debate. The people of this Republic made their decision on access to abortion care in 2018 by an overwhelming majority in the affirmative. Many opposed to this Bill will say that the electorate in that referendum made its decision on the basis of the terms set out in the Bill passed into l…

This morning, the Taoiseach opened a cost-of-disability summit. Immediately prior to him doing so, the Minister for Social Protection was on “Morning Ireland” and refused to commit to a cost-of-disability payment in the forthcoming budget. Over the past month, the Government refused to introduce targeted energy credits that would benefit people with disabilities. Earlier this year, it refused to support my motion for an emergency payment for people with disabilities. In that debate, the Minister for Social Protecti…

The recent report by the ISME noted that there was a decline in SME credit balances from €62 billion in 2011 to €17.8 billion in 2023, despite headline economic growth in Ireland during that period. That is a stunning drop of 70% in capital to indigenous companies since the Taoiseach was last in government. He says he is a pro-enterprise Taoiseach but the evidence points to the contrary. What will he do to improve the conditions for indigenous enterprises in Ireland?

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Two years ago I canvassed in the local elections. One day in Harold’s Cross I knocked on the door of a man about my age. He came to the door. There were toys in the hallway and he was making dinner for his kids. I asked him what were the kinds of political issues that were on his mind and he said, “The cost of living”. That was May 2024. Two years later I think about that man, with everything that has happened since then – energy costs accelerating to the highest in Europe, punishing rental or interest rates, inacc…

The living conditions faced by Dubliners in social housing flats built between the 1930s and 1960s are frankly unconscionable. I have heard stories from people who are desperate, who are enraged and who, increasingly, are resigned to the failure of this State to uphold their human rights. I get countless pleas in my constituency of Dublin Bay South from people living in flats with mouldy walls, rotting woodwork and rat infestations in places like Pearse House and Markievicz House. The endless tick-tacking between c…

The subject of my question is child poverty. Central Statistics Office, CSO, figures that were released recently show that the consistent poverty rate for families headed by lone parents was about 13.4% last year compared with 11% in 2024. It is a 22% increase in consistent poverty for one of the most vulnerable groups in the country, including the children they take care of. Will the Minister confirm what new measures the Department is designing to reverse this trend?

I thank the Minister for his reply. Many of those payments and changes are welcome but there is a question, in the context of the growing hardship on families, the cost of energy and the cost-of-living crisis, that people are being left behind. Potential talent, in particular, is being left behind at a young age if we do not reverse the trend of consistent child poverty. The Government's target is about 3%; 7.8% is still quite a long way off, despite the things the Minister has worked on. In our alternative budget,…

It is worthwhile to read into the record some of the harrowing stories presented by St. Vincent de Paul and the reality faced by lone parents. One parent said: "I can't get control, we can't make plans, it's like being in a deep hole, no matter what we do we can’t get out of it. We climb up and fall back in." Another single mother told the organisation: "I find life very hard, not being able to pay all my bills and always putting some on the long finger. The stress makes me sick. I’m always worrying knowing that my…