The Deputy is right to say we can learn from other countries but we should not be naive about what things look like in other countries either. Anyone who has walked the streets of Paris or Marseilles will see the kind of homelessness problem that exists there and how much worse it has got in the past ten or 20 years. I acknowledge the Deputy does not think there is any quick fix to these things and nor do I. A number of measures are required and there are many in place already. Let us not forget all new tenancies a…

I thank Deputy Lowry for raising this important issue. I appreciate that University Hospital Limerick is not just a hospital for Limerick, but for a whole region, including north Tipperary, Clare and the wider County Limerick. This morning, there were 21 patients on trolleys in Limerick. Eleven had been on trolleys for more than nine hours. That is a bad situation and is not acceptable at all. However, it is not the worst that it has been. We do see some evidence of some improvement in Limerick in the last few week…

No decision at this stage has been made by the Government in relation to an elective hospital in the mid-west. It is open for consideration. I do not think it is a bad idea at all. I am realistic about it because I know how long it takes, believe me, to get a hospital through design and planning and then built. Realistically, it would take six years. In the meantime, the mid-west region has a new private hospital that will be under construction quite soon. That might be useful to us for public patients to access th…

I thank the Deputy. We should acknowledge at the outset that roughly half of carbon tax is paid by businesses and the other half by individuals. It varies a good deal from one individual to another. It is not just a rural-urban matter. It depends on how big your house is and how you heat it, whether you drive and what type of car you drive. There are many things people can do to reduce their carbon tax liability, regardless of whether they live in urban or rural areas. I acknowledge that a greater burden is going t…

No it is not.

Once again, the Minister for Transport does not issue public transport licences. That is not his function. The NTA does so on the basis of the law, regulations and certain criteria. I do not know why it refused that licence. From what the Deputy tells me, there is not an alternative service available. Sometimes it will refuse an application if an existing Bus Éireann service is available. The Deputy has indicated that there is not such a service. I will certainly get my office to make inquiries with the NTA as to w…

The reason we do not want to do that is because, as Deputy Bacik knows, any time you nationalise something you have to compensate the owners. Even if we were to nationalise Corrib for two, three, four or ten years, we would have to compensate the owners at a cost of many billions of euro. I would rather spend those many billions of euro helping people to reduce their bills than compensating a private company. That is the reason. What we propose to do, which makes more sense to me, is impose a windfall profit tax on…

Soon.

As I mentioned earlier, we hear the voice of the students who have been protesting today. Students are being affected by the cost-of-living crisis just like almost everyone else in our society. We are helping by increasing the student grant and making more people eligible for it, reducing the cost of student fees, reducing the cost of public transport and, crucially, the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, Deputy Harris, is intervening to unlock some of the purpose-built stu…

I hear the voice of students today. I understand that they are being affected by the cost-of-living crisis, as are most people in our society. What was done in the budget was significant and should not be dismissed in the way the Deputy has dismissed it. What was done will be worth hundreds of euro to some students and thousands to others. There is a €1,000 reduction in the student fee and €500 next year. We intend to build on that in the years ahead. More students will qualify for the Student Universal Support Ire…

The second cath lab in Waterford is nearing completion. We expect-----

We expect the handover to be completed as early as this month. In addition, the modular emergency department and outpatient facility are scheduled to be equipped and commissioned in the first quarter of next year. That will facilitate the expansion of the hours of the permanent pacemaker implantation, PPI, service and the cardiology service in Waterford. There will be a challenge around recruitment. Recruiting people to work 24-7, nights and weekends, not just for a few years but for their entire careers, is a real…

There are 451 beds in the hospital.

I join the Deputy in welcoming the students from Skibbereen. It is a very fine town. I had a chance to visit it a couple months ago. They are most welcome on their visit to Dublin. What are we doing to help students? There is a €1,000 reduction in the student fee, and a permanent reduction of €500 will kick in from next year. Bear in mind that student fees in Northern Ireland are €5,000 a year. Just contrast that, for example, with what we are doing here. This is the first reduction in 27 years. The student grant i…

I am not a dentist, so I cannot comment on the dental question. As a doctor, the jury is out on the idea of an annual checkup, quite frankly. Sometimes annual checkups pick up illnesses and abnormalities that would not be picked up until later. Sometimes early intervention can result in better outcomes, but it can also result in a large number of unnecessary investigations. The Deputy will know of people who have been for a health check and were sent off for any number of tests, all of which came back normal. Not o…

I thank the Deputy. I am afraid that I do not have a timeline on it. I will ask the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, or the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, to revert to the Deputy in that regard. The Government acknowledges, however, that the cost of running a nursing home has increased, whether that is staff costs, energy costs or regulatory costs, and that needs be reflected in the payments they receive from the Government. That is what we intend to do. It is true that about a dozen nursing homes have closed recently…

We have not set a date for those referendums at this stage. As the Deputy is aware, keeping Irish Water in public ownership is very much there in the law. I am not sure who is proposing to privatise it. I have not heard anyone suggest that. As regards housing, the Housing Commission is doing very good work on the wording of that amendment and has just completed a public consultation. Approximately 2,000 people participated in that, which is quite a lot. We will have to see what the wording is before we can proceed …

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta as a ceist faoi fhógraí uisce ar na hoileáin. I can certainly raise the matter with Irish Water and ask it to provide níos mó eolais, more information on those services.

I am aware of the issue and I understand, and we all accept, that the water supply is safe in south Dublin and north Wicklow. Safe is not the same as high quality, however, and people have a right to expect water that is of high quality and does not taste bad or smell offensive. I do not know the story behind that or why it has happened but I will certainly get my office to make inquiries and see if we can provide a report to Deputy Devlin on it.

It is very important that public transport services, such as buses, trains or Luas services, are reliable. That is one of the reasons people take public transport - they can avoid the traffic and have some reliability in terms of when they leave and when they arrive. We have a lot of real-time passenger information to help passengers in that regard. I hear what the Deputy says, however, about the particular Go-Ahead services in her constituency. I do not have any information on that to hand but I will inform the Mi…