I begin by welcoming developments for peace in Gaza, as I know we all do, and hope we will see the start of a path to real peace for all in the Middle East. I think we can agree that we are all living in the real world. In the real world, it is a good thing that we are having a debate about energy prices. It is a good thing that we are debating the cost of energy. However, the "cost of energy" is a misnomer because the prices being inflicted by energy companies on households are reflecting practices of gross profit…

I said "targeted".

We said that in our budget.

I absolutely reject the idea that we are playing to the Gallery. With respect, what I have heard from the Taoiseach does not do anything for the 300,000 households in arrears on their electricity bills or the 185,000 in arrears on their gas bills. The Taoiseach is talking about reviews and task forces. I do agree structural reform is needed because what we are seeing is that the liberalisation of energy markets has failed. Competition has not delivered fairer prices for consumers. Energy companies are not competing…

-----from November to March. Why not ban disconnections for all households for five months over winter-----

-----as a stopgap measure while we are bringing in structural-----

Yesterday the Taoiseach was asked about the Baggot Street Hospital, which is an iconic State-owned building in our city centre that has scandalously been left to fall into dereliction. Councillor Dermot Lacey and I have been raising the need for it to be given new life and given over to housing for years. I have heard of a private joke in one Department regarding robust campaigning by Labour representatives on it. I have been told for years the Government would examine the use of Baggot Street Hospital. What has ha…

Hear, hear.

On behalf of the Labour Party, I begin by offering our deepest condolences again to Gillian Sherratt and Stephen Morrison, the parents of young Harvey Morrison Sherratt. I have spoken, as have my colleagues, with Gillian previously and we are thinking of them today, as indeed we are thinking of all the parents of children with scoliosis and spina bifida who have faced unconscionable delays and obstacles in accessing necessary treatments and necessary surgeries for their children. All of us are thinking of the exper…

It is not the way-----

Cuirim fáilte roimh all the visitors in the Public Gallery and the Distinguished Visitors Gallery. The Taoiseach just said that housing is the single biggest issue facing us. We all agree on that but I do not know whether the Taoiseach agrees that the housing system is broken. It has been commodified and marketised. The private rental sector is filling the gaps left by lengthy social housing lists. Far too many people are in homelessness and the Government has presided over an extraordinary failure and a significan…

Will the Government take a radical step to address this and prevent more children falling into homelessness and consider introducing a temporary eviction ban in cases where children are concerned?

I have listened carefuly to the Taoiseach's answer and every time I raise housing or the appalling and shocking figure of 5,000 children in homelessness with him, he engages in what I may describe as classic deflection tactics. Previously when I raised the failure to sustain the tenant in situ scheme, a scheme we welcomed, the Taoiseach blamed local authorities. Now he is blaming judicial reviews. The reality is the Taoiseach and his Government have to take responsibility for what is a housing disaster and what has…

We welcomed that and we welcomed tenant in situ but I am asking the Taoiseach this again.

I am putting forward to him a constructive way to address the scourge of child homelessness and he has not answered that question.

Evictions are hugely important.

This week marks Baby Loss Awareness Week, an opportunity for people to mark the personal tragedy of a pregnancy loss. Miscarriage in the later stages of pregnancy gives women the right to take maternity leave but those who lose a pregnancy earlier in the term have no right to paid time off work to recover. We in the Labour Party brought forward legislation to give women paid time off, up to 20 days, for early pregnancy loss and up to ten days for employees accessing reproductive healthcare treatments like IVF, leav…

Go raibh maith agat-----

Yesterday’s budget was a deep disappointment. There is real anger out there. The Government made choices in this budget that are impacting really adversely on so many people. As my colleague Deputy Nash said in what I think was the line of the day yesterday, this is a budget that is giving handouts to burger barons and big builders, but broken promises for everyone else. People see that, and this is raw for students facing a €500 fee increase, parents seeing no reduction in childcare costs - when they can get a chi…

Certainly, in last year's budget there was a very different approach taken. It was a giveaway budget to buy people's votes. This year, the Government has made very different choices. Let us be clear about those choices. The Taoiseach referenced child poverty. We in Labour put forward last week a children's budget; a costed set of proposals that would have made meaningful steps to tackling the scourge of child poverty and child homelessness. In the Ministers' budget speeches, there was no reference to homelessness.