In a week when we in the Opposition called for the urgent introduction of temporary targeted measures to alleviate the real hardship caused by the cost-of-living crisis, we are instead seeing urgency in the rushing through of Bills. Yet, there is no urgency in bringing forward measures that should have been done to address the cost-of-living crisis. Instead, we see five Bills will be shoehorned into five hours of debate on Committee and Remaining Stages tomorrow. These are significant Bills, including the remediati…

Today the High Court is hearing an application from Tipperary man Johnny O’Meara. In 2021, very tragically, Johnny’s partner, Michelle Batey died after an illness. Johnny contacted Deputy Kelly and me after he had been refused widower’s pension and recognition from the Department of Social Protection. It did not recognise his sad loss because he and Michelle had not been married. There was no recognition by the State of the 20 years they had shared living together, of their children, Aoife, Jack and Tommy, or of th…

As parents across the country fear the rising costs of the back to school dates that are looming ahead, there are some parents who fear September even more. That is because over 200 children still do not have a school place on the last day in June for the coming September term. It was a privilege yesterday to be joined by parents, advocates, SNAs, teachers and young people for the debate on the Labour Party's Autism Bill 2022, which seeks to address the serious shortfall in provision for autistic people, both adult…

The response is inadequate. It is simply not good enough that there are 100 children in Dublin alone who do not have a school place for this coming September. This is 30 June, the end of the school year. As I said, we heard yesterday from parents who are very frustrated. In some cases they have had to approach 18 or 25 schools simply to try to get a place for their child and were still unable to do so. Many parents in my constituency, Dublin Bay South, are at the end of their tether trying to secure places. There i…

In the context of the cost-of-living crisis, I will raise the critical issue of childcare. We know that costs of childcare for parents are far too high, wages for early years professionals are too low and there is an abject shortage of places for children. Across my constituency, I hear all the time from parents who are worn out from trying to find a crèche or early years education place or who have been told there is no preschool facility available for their child until 2024. We need a guarantee - a Donogh O'Malle…

It gives me great pleasure to second this Bill on behalf of the Labour Party. I commend my colleague, Deputy Ó Ríordáin, on speaking so passionately in proposing it. He has fought so hard for so long on the rights of children with autism in education. As he said, we are very glad to be joined today in the Public Gallery by many parents who have spent so long fighting for the rights of their children. I thank them very much for engaging with us. We appreciated the opportunity to learn from and speak to them this mor…

Yesterday I raised a constituent’s story with the Taoiseach. While searching for a rented home, my constituent was invited to participate in what he described as a bidding war. The landlord was asking prospective tenants to indicate how much they were willing to pay per month in rent. I am not suggesting that is representative of all landlords by any means but this shocking example is a consequence of a broken housing system, a housing disaster as our President recently described it. My offices and those of my Labo…

Yesterday, we heard further evidence to of just how deep the cost-of-living crisis is biting households around the country. We heard it from the Free Legal Advice Centres, FLAC, which told us how calls to their helplines are up and, in particular, we heard it from Barnardos, which described to us in such shocking terms how so many families cannot afford decent clothes or shoes for their children, who are forced to buy open-toed shoes, sandals or flip-flops in the hope that those will last longer, and are simply una…

We are very happy to work constructively with the Government to ensure targeted measures are introduced that tackle the real hardship being faced by those on the lowest of incomes. We are prepared to sit beyond and through the summer if that is what it takes to deal with the sort of targeted measures that are necessary, such as a summer social welfare bonus that could be introduced as a targeted measure to alleviate the real hardships faced by those on low incomes. We are very much prepared to do this. We very much…

We need an emergency debate on homelessness and the housing crisis. I spoke earlier about the enormous pressure on people trying to find a new home when they have been evicted. We are seeing evictions at a record high. That is a very serious concern. I would also raise another concern about the ordering of business, which is just the huge number of Bills before this House and the other House. There are nine Bills in each House this week alone. This is a year after President Michael D. Higgins reportedly wrote to yo…

That is not true.

Following the awful decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in overturning Roe v . Wade on Friday, we know hundreds of thousands of women and girls in the US have been plunged into crisis. We need to ensure, here in Ireland, that we are addressing the real needs of women and girls in crisis pregnancy by ensuring adequate access to abortion healthcare, particularly given the 66.4% majority of the people who voted for repeal of the eighth amendment in 2018. We have learned that 206 women had to travel from…

I wish to raise with the Taoiseach the loss of face-to-face services and the curtailment of access to community amenities in public services. This is having a very significant impact on the well-being of communities, and in my constituency we have seen the continued closure of the Citizens Information centre in Rathmines. A public meeting I organised on this recently drew a huge crowd who were very concerned at the loss of this face-to-face service. Many people trying to deal with Government agencies find themselve…

As we know, in February there were planned Russian naval exercises in Irish waters. These were eventually moved due to the campaign of Mr. Patrick Murphy and the Irish South and West Fish Producers Organisation who threatened to sail out to meet the navy. Last week the same organisation had a second victory when planned manoeuvres by the French navy were moved outside of Irish waters. The organisation, with which I have engaged closely, is raising legitimate concerns about the impact such military exercises will ha…

An agreement with the Catholic Church on patronage was reached in March to cover five towns that currently have no multidenominational primary school provision and to cover the cities of Dublin, Cork, Limerick and Galway and encourage greater levels of divestment in keeping with parents' wishes. The proof, however, will be in how many schools change their status, given the Catholic Church remains the patron of 90% of primary schools in this country. We in Labour have consistently called for a citizens' assembly to …

I am conscious that the main purpose of this Bill is to ensure we have sufficient electricity generation in place for this winter through to 2026 following the direction from the CRU to EirGrid to procure an extra 450 MW of power generation capacity. We appreciate the Government was left in the unenviable position of having to get this legislation through as quickly as possible to ensure EirGrid can legally procure the generators and have them in place. We understand EirGrid will then sell and transfer those to an …

I wish to ask the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage the status of An Bord Pleanála's review report published in 2016, his views on each recommendation, the recommendations that have been implemented to date and if he will make a statement on the matter. I am conscious that this is particularly timely, given that this is a week in which we were to see the presentation to the Minister of the report from Remy Farrell SC, which I and other Opposition speakers spoke about in the Dáil in the past few da…

I thank the Minister of State for the update. It is, however, of some concern that of the 101 recommendations made by the independent review group in 2016, only 36, or just over one third, have been completed. The others appear to be ongoing or are still to be determined. In the context of such serious allegations about impropriety and a conflict of interest in the operation of An Bord Pleanála over recent months, it is of real concern that recommendations to address systemic failures and issues made years ago have…

I thank the Minister of State for the update. I appreciate that the Minister has not seen the report from Remy Farrell SC. I am glad to hear a commitment to transparency when the report is produced and provided to the Minister. However, this is not just about transparency, but also the ability of all on the Opposition and Government sides to be able to scrutinise the findings in any report in a timely manner. In recent months we have seen a drip feed of very serious allegations. The terms of reference provided to R…

Later this afternoon, my colleague, Deputy Ó Ríordáin, will introduce Labour's autism Bill, which would create a coherent framework for addressing the needs of children with autism. The need for this sort of legislation has become patently clear in recent weeks and months. That need has been clear for a long time for the parents of children with autism who have been waiting for so long to see proper and effective provision made for their children. Last weekend, I had the pleasure of attending a training session inv…