Where is the central leadership?

After 20 months of bombing, more than 50,000 people have now been killed in Gaza. A further 117,000 have been injured, thousands of them children. What we are witnessing is a genocide, and we do not use that term lightly. It is in truth a systematic extermination of the Palestinian people through bombardment tactics by Israel and now through starvation tactics as well, as we have seen a denial of all aid into the Gaza Strip for 71 days and a man-made famine taking hold. Today at 1 o'clock, my colleague Senator Cosg…

It has been 71 days.

The so-called housing tsar debacle has left more questions than answers, and not just about salary either. The Minister for housing has been very quiet in responding to these questions. We need to hear from him in the Dáil. He must come to us to explain how he proposes his new housing activation office will work. He cannot leave explanations to the Minister of State with responsibility for nature and biodiversity, as he did on the radio last Friday. Over recent weeks, we have heard plenty of noise from Government a…

It is very difficult to take seriously the Government's commitments on infrastructure or on housing delivery. On infrastructure, what is clear from the correspondence and the revelations about Uisce Éireann is that it simply has not been provided with the necessary additional resourcing to enable it to step up to provide the vital connections that are necessary to ensure building at scale. On the delivery of homes, there is that 40,000 figure we now know is 10,000 off and across the country we are seeing communitie…

When?

Israel must be made accountable for the genocide it is perpetrating upon the Palestinian people. We are seeing the appalling escalation of the ongoing brutal bombardment and now starvation tactics that are being used upon a civilian population in Gaza. We are hearing desperate appeals for help from aid agencies and the UN, and we are seeing so many horrific deaths, including of children and civilians, yet Israel appears to act with impunity. The Taoiseach has described the Israeli actions as war crimes. Those are w…

I wish everyone today a happy May Day. Many workers across the State are looking forward to a day off on Monday; a public holiday introduced by the Labour Party to mark International Workers' Day. It is important we mark this day. Its purpose is more than just celebrating the progress made on workers' rights in the past 100 years because May Day is also when we shine a light on the continued exploitation, poverty and inequality experienced by far too many people still. Today, we think of all those working families …

-----and stick with that 2026 deadline? Can he give workers a hope on May Day, a hope for the future, to move them out of the poverty trap?

I have certainly acknowledged positive advances made for workers' rights, fought for and campaigned for by trade unions and the trade union movement. At a time when we are seeing significant divisions emerging between the Tánaiste and his senior coalition partner in Fianna Fáil, perhaps this is the time for him to carve out a space on workers' rights that emphasises the difference between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, not just on "fixers with nixers" but on issues that actually matter to working people. The Tánaiste's…

I second the motion and commend my Labour colleague, Deputy Eoghan Kenny, who has devised this motion and tabled it with such passion and strong advocacy. I welcome those in the Public Gallery who join us for the debate. We have quite a number of parents and groups campaigning on behalf of children who have been deprived of their right to an education by the State. I will single out from my own constituency the Neurodiversity - Irishtown, Ringsend and Pearse Street, NIRP, organisation, whose representatives are her…

Last Friday, we learned 15,418 people were recorded as homeless in March, another shameful new high. Nearly 5,000 children are now growing up in Ireland without a home. Each homeless child is a tragedy. There are now 22 more children homeless than there were last month. This is a national scandal. It is the civil rights issue of our generation. As legislators, we must do all we can to see this housing disaster addressed. We must build affordable and social homes, protect renters and tackle vacancy and dereliction, …

This move looks like nothing more than an exercise in the evasion of accountability. What will this body actually do?

There is so much to challenge in what the Taoiseach just said, with respect. First, he cannot stand over his Government's figures on delivery of homes when it promised 40,000 homes last year and the actual delivery was 10,000 short, a shocking shortfall. It is utterly indefensible. No one, even in the Government or in Fianna Fáil, will stand over that figure. Second, the Taoiseach says he never said that the Government would get rid of the RPZs; I did not say he did.

I hear every day from renters in my constituency-----

-----who are desperately worried because of the review of RPZs announced by the Government. The reason is there are so few homes available to rent. If they cannot afford to pay their rent any longer, they have nowhere else to go. It comes back to delivery of homes. The Government is ignoring the crucial recommendation of the Housing Commission that the Government should introduce a radical reset of housing policy. We in the Labour Party called for the State take a far more active role in direct delivery-----

-----of homes through the Land Development Agency, ramped up-----

-----to provide State-built homes, as was done in the seventies, which the Taoiseach keeps referring to as the golden age of house building.

He promised 40,000 homes.

You said they were not high enough.