In respect of the staff who are currently on €27,000, will they not experience the uplift to €30,000 when the threshold changes?

There is no automatic uplift.

I move amendment No. 9: In page 18, to delete lines 19 to 37.

I sincerely thank Deputy Ó Broin and Sinn Féin for bringing the motion before the House. It is unfortunate and, frankly, troubling that we have to discuss housing and homelessness so often in the Chamber but, as we are all aware, this is the sad reality. This is the issue of our time. It is very rare that you can point to a single issue and say that is what is uniquely holding our country back. However, as the President put it a couple of years ago, the disaster that is housing in Ireland is the single biggest barr…

I am privileged to support the Bill for several reasons. It is very much anchored in two areas of policy that are synonymous with the best traditions of the Labour Party, namely, workplace rights and the vindication of the reproductive rights of women. Pregnancy loss is utterly cruel. It is deeply personal, harrowing and physical and has a lasting emotional impact. For a woman who is going through that cruel loss, it is often far too painful to even discuss. It is not an illness or a sickness, however, and we shoul…

When I read last week's story by Killian Woods of the Business Post about the bulk-purchase of new homes by an institutional investor at Belcamp Manor in north Dublin, it was gut-wrenching but it must have felt like a real punch in the guts for first-time buyers from the area who are anxious and are working hard to buy their forever home. The odds are stacked against them and here is what makes this situation even more obnoxious: it is their own Government that is deliberately making it so. The game is, frankly, ri…

I welcome the ambitious Digital Services Act regulation and recognise that European law in this area continues to be the global leader. I also welcome this Bill. The Labour Party will support its transition through the stages to ensure it is enforced by 17 February. In much the same way that the general data protection regulation, GDPR, led the way in privacy rights, the Digital Services Act leads the way in social and market responsibility in online spaces. ComReg called the Digital Services Act a paradigm shift i…

I welcome the Minister. While this Bill is something of a housekeeping exercise, it is nonetheless important that we are having some class of parliamentary debate on it. The Minister will recall it was not that long ago when we did not have debates of this nature on the annual Appropriation Bill. It simply went through on the nod, sadly, a little like our Supplementary Estimates this year. I will return to that matter shortly. As the Minister says, this Bill provides the legal authority for all 2023 expenditure and…

A full minute over time. It is nonsense.

I commend Deputy Shanahan on bringing this important Bill forward. Its principles have considerable merit. As a party that believes in transparency in all aspects of public life, including and especially the expenditure of public money, the Labour Party fully supports the Bill. As was said, what it seeks to achieve is simple and quite straightforward. The Government might argue about the mechanics of the Bill and how its provisions can be implemented in practice but, in some respects, that is an argument for anothe…

In my constituency since August we have had three separate and significant flooding events. There were two in Bettystown and Mornington, and one as we know more recently in north County Louth. We know ad hoc schemes are available to support businesses in distress, such as those which cannot obtain insurance. The Minister is on record stating he will introduce more permanent statutory schemes. Will he elaborate on when that might be the case?

I was wrong. Pardon me.

Start with the written one, please.

I apologise for the earlier confusion. As Deputy Richmond knows, I expected not to be here as we were stuck on the M1. Deputy O'Reilly probably was too. I thank the Minister for that clarification. We have all received significant correspondence from businesses in our own constituencies concerned about additional costs for their businesses, as a result of positive moves relating to increases to the national minimum wage for example. Those are absolutely required, but we all understand the additional costs that aris…

The Minister may not have this at a granular level. As I raised at the outset, is it the case that businesses will have to be in good stead with the local authority in terms of their repayment of rates?

Does that mean, for example, that a business will qualify if it is restructuring its arrangements with a local authority for a repayment scheme, as many have done in recent years because of the difficulties they may have experienced in trading through Covid and so on? If they are in an arrangement with a local authority for a repayment scheme, I assume they will qualify for that support. The last thing we want is difficulty being loaded upon difficulty for businesses at the moment for reasons that we all understand…

This question relates to concerns I raised with the Minister via parliamentary question and subsequent to a report by Mr. Conor Gallagher in The Irish Times in July that alleged that Irish-made parts were found on Ukrainian battlefields, allegedly as components of Russian military hardware. I would appreciate an update on the issue. Have sanctions been breached? Is it the view of Department officials that sanctions were breached? Has a determination been made? What action, if any, has been taken on that matter?

Undoubtedly it is extremely complex, and I understand that. For the record, while we are talking here, I do not want to identify the company, even though it has been identified in the media, unless undue reputational damage would be done. I understand that an investigation is ongoing. What we are referring to here is something that was brought to the attention of the public by Mr. Conor Gallagher in The Irish Times . There was an article with a photograph of a Iranian-made drone that was found in wreckage in a city…

We have finally got to flooding in Louth. I would appreciate an update from the Minister on the nature of the statutory scheme he is considering to provide enhanced business supports for firms that are the victims of flooding. There are ad hoc schemes that the Minister brought to Cabinet recently in response to particular flooding events. There have been three such events in my constituency since August. There were floods in Bettystown and Mornington and, as the Minister will be aware, there was a more recent flood…

I thank the Minister. Can we assume the statutory scheme, when he brings it forward, will look very similar to the business flood relief and enhanced flood relief schemes? Will he give a timeline on their introduction? I want to record my appreciation to him for the rapid response by him and his Department on the introduction of a scheme for Louth on foot of the devastating experience by many businesses in the Carlingford area of north Louth at the end of October and in early November. He will accept that bringing …