You would know that there was a poll at the weekend. Every time Sinn Féin slides, the only thing it seems to think it can talk about is housing. Yet, every time they talk about housing after a polling collapse, they make another blunder of some kind. What I hear most now in Tipperary is people saying how Sinn Féin does not have a clue what it is talking about. It does it week after week after week. It was just done here two minutes ago by the previous Senator, who spoke of how people are struggling, cannot afford t…

Through the Chair, I actually welcome the interruption. The Senator said it would be because it would increase the price of housing. I do not agree with her but let us say she is right. Let us take an example of a house in Clonmel that costs €300,000 where someone wants to buy that house at the moment. Let us go with Senator Boylan’s argument. They are struggling, they cannot afford it and they cannot save for a deposit. Under the current Government-----

No, listen.

If the Senators listened they might actually understand why the public has now lost faith in them. Essentially, that person has to pay €300,000 and supposedly cannot afford to save. Let us say they cannot afford to save for a deposit. Under this Fine Gael Government, they do not need to because they have the help-to-buy scheme. They will be able to get €30,000 to buy that house. That can be used as their deposit. Let us take Sinn Féin's proposal, which is that that increases the cost of a house. I do not agree with…

This is what we are dealing with.

They actually make no sense.

It is embarrassing for people to listen to. That is even without them talking about how they will build a house for €300,000 in Dublin. There is not a person in the country, apart from the spokesperson for housing in Sinn Féin and the leader of Sinn Féin, who seems to believe that. I hardly think the rest of the party actually believes that it is possible to build a house for €300,000. I welcome the debate on housing here, because we are hitting targets. In fact, we are beating Sinn Féin’s five-year target on socia…

Sinn Féin speaks of targets-----

-----and we can talk about that all we want. We have built 100,000 houses in the last four years in this Government.

Thirty-two thousand. What are your targets on social housing?

There is the desperation of interruption, the desperation of talking about housing and the collapse of support for Sinn Féin. They do not what to do. They do not know what to talk about. They think they know something about housing, but every time they talk about it, they now lose more support. We go on and on. People are looking at Sinn Féin now and are saying there is no alternative.

Everyone on the minimum wage.

I second the amendment by my colleague, Senator McGahon. I too want to raise University Hospital Limerick. I concur with comments made by Senator Dooley about management of the hospital. At some point last year, Fine Gael had Private Members' business here with my other colleagues from the region, Senators Maria Byrne and Conway. Since then, nothing has got better. The Minister has put in extra funding but nothing has changed. It has actually got worse. There are more than 140 people on trolleys today, which is the…

I thank the Acting Chair. I am covering for Senator Ward today. The Minister of State and his officials are very welcome to the Chamber. I agree with the previous Senator in that we should have a debate on this topic. Even though this matter needs to be dealt with by tomorrow, it is important that we have a debate on it. From the Fine Gael perspective, we support what the Minister of State is bringing forward today. It makes perfect sense. Rather than all countries within the European Union individually having a pl…

I agree with Senator Horkan. I thank the Minister of State and officials for the work they have done on this important legislation. It is being put through in a timely manner.

The Minister of State is very welcome to the Chamber. I thank him for taking this very important question, which relates to inland fisheries, particularly fishermen and clubs in Tipperary. The River Suir is regarded as one of the best rivers in the country for salmon fishing. About a third of the salmon are in the rivers Suir, Nore and Barrow. The stock has been depleting over many years, but since 1995 there has been a catch-and-release policy. Essentially, this is to protect the fish, which is very important. The…

I thank the Minister of State for his reply, which was appreciated. It is the detail I am looking for. I acknowledge that the response states IFI will provide the detail. I am referring to the simple things. The IFI says it gets weekly calls to the hotline and that it responds to them in a timely manner, but there is no information about how many calls it gets per week. It would be good to get detailed information on the number of nets that have been seized per year for the last ten years. That would be extremely h…

I also welcome Senator McGreehan's brother. If, as she claims, he is responsible for her having an interest in politics, then I blame him for the arguments I have with her in this Chamber, although we are meant to be on the same side. I welcome the news today from the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell, on the plans for the town centre first programme right across the country. It has been announced today that towns in every county in Ireland will be prioritised by the Government…

I welcome the Minister of State, a former Seanadóir, back to the House. I thank the Minister of State and his officials for the work they have done on this. It is funny that for years I only knew of work permits as things that soccer players coming from abroad needed to be able to play in the UK. In the last number of years they have become a big thing in Ireland. The reason for this is because of job creation in the country in the past ten years. We are almost at a point now, with the Department of Enterprise, Tra…

Next Tuesday.