It is important to point out that funding was provided to Nenagh in County Tipperary as part of this round for a very good project in that town. The Clonmel project is good. I visited Clonmel not that long ago with Senator Ahearn, before he became a Senator, and had a chance to go to the old Bulmers site and to understand the concept behind the project, which is to bring Limerick Institute of Technology, LIT, into the town and make use of the barracks. As the Deputy rightly says, Clonmel is a historic borough town.…

It would be appropriate for the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage to give an explanation to the council and I am sure it will do so. Hopefully the project can be funded in the next round because using the Bulmers assets and the barracks, bringing LIT into the town and building the sports hub would be of huge benefit to Clonmel. I will continue to work with the Deputy and Senator Ahearn on this matter.

I am afraid I cannot answer that question as I do not know. This decision will be made on foot of the best scientific and medical advice from the national immunisation advisory committee, NIAC, and that is the best way to make these decisions. The workers who will be prioritised are those who are required by virtue of their work to come into close social contact with other people - essentially, people who cannot social distance. I appreciate that An Post delivery workers have sprung to mind for Deputy Pringle, and …

I do not know for sure. I think I recollect that an issue arose because others who were redeployed into contact tracing from other parts of the public service were not getting an additional allowance. As is so often the case when it comes to public sector pay issues, while a case may be justified on the face of things it triggers a set of knock-on claims which then make it unaffordable. That might be the reason but I might be wrong so I will ask the Minister for Defence, Deputy Coveney, to come back to the Deputy d…

I thank the Deputy. I will certainly raise this issue with the Minister of State, Deputy Madigan, and will ask her to look into it. She is the Minister of State with responsibility for special education, as the Deputy is aware, and this is an issue that has also been raised by Deputy Colm Burke, by the Minister, Deputy Coveney, and by Senator Buttimer. I cannot make a commitment on the floor of the House but we will certainly have this examined. In my own constituency we had to fight quite hard to secure our first …

I thank the Deputies for their questions. We will give as much clarity and hope as we can on Tuesday. We will also need to be honest as we are not out of the woods yet. I am hopeful about the summer but the next couple of weeks are very worrying. The situation is deteriorating across Europe and appears to be deteriorating here as well. We will give people as much clarity as we can but we have seen on so many occasions that this virus rips up our plans. I do not want to give people assurances for six weeks’ time tha…

I acknowledge the fact that much of our local authority housing and social housing is substandard in my constituency and in that of the Deputy. It would be only fair for the Deputy to acknowledge also the huge investment that has gone into improving, upgrading and renewing social housing and local authority housing in my constituency and his. Some major redevelopment is under way throughout the country to improve and bring social housing up to an acceptable standard. This will continue. At the same time, we also ne…

The Leas-Cheann Comhairle should not be embarrassed at all at mistaking Deputy McAuliffe for Deputy Richmond. I am regularly mistaken for the Taoiseach and we look nothing alike. I can see no reason anyone could not make an honest mistake about the two Deputies. On the question at hand, this is a long-standing issue. It has been a problem for more than a decade. Five Governments have tried to deal with it. There is a fundamental difficulty in solving the problem. CE supervisors appear to be seeking a public sector …

I thank the Deputy. Deputy Higgins was also on to me about this issue recently. I do not know what the cause for the delay is but the community needs a primary care centre soon so I will take it up with the relevant Ministers and come back to the Deputy with some progress, hopefully soon.

I thank the Deputies for raising this important issue. We published the climate Bill earlier this week and it commits us to a 51% reduction in emissions between now and the end of 2030. In the main, the emissions come from transport, agriculture and buildings, including our homes, so retrofit will have to be a huge part of the way forward. There will be public consultation on this. We will need the proceeds from the carbon tax to help co-fund it. The two are inextricably linked. It is very ambitious because we will…

I thank the Deputy for again raising this important matter of insurance. The Government is pursuing its action plan on insurance reform. The objective of that action plan is to make insurance more available for people and businesses and to reduce the cost of premiums charged to people and businesses for motor insurance, home insurance, public liability insurance, employers liability insurance and indeed all forms of insurance. A major part of the Government's action plan on insurance reform was to replace the old b…

I do not speak for the insurance industry. Perhaps Deputy Doherty does. He is very keen to quote the representatives of that industry on any occasion. I do not speak for the insurance industry. Perhaps the Deputy does, but I do not. The personal injury guidelines were announced at the weekend. I do not know if the Deputy's contention that they will become law in two weeks is true. We must enact legislation in this House first, then we need it to go through the Seanad and then it needs to be signed by the President.…

I am pro-European too and a big supporter of the European project and European integration, but like the Deputy I do not believe that necessarily means one cannot criticise the European Commission on occasion, and perhaps this is one of those occasions. I very much support the fact that we took the decision to adopt a common European approach. I was Taoiseach during the first wave of this pandemic and I remember what it was like when every individual country was competing with one another and struggling to get pers…

The provision for export bans exists and Italy has started down that road. I understand there is going to be a meeting of Heads of State and Government to discuss vaccines quite soon but I do not know the date for that. Tá an clár vacsaíne faoi lánseol. Tá an chéad dáileog faighte anois ag formhór an lucht cónaithe in ionaid chúraim fadtéarmacha, oibrithe cúraim shláinte agus daoine atá 85 bliain d’aois nó níos sine. Is léir go raibh frustrachas faoi leith ann nuair a d’athraigh comhlachtaí an sceideal seachadta. I…

The Government is committed to education and to improving education in Ireland at all levels over the coming years. Education is the great leveller. It raises people up, gives them opportunities and allows them to learn more, earn more and build a better life for themselves and their children. That is why I am proud to have been a member of governments that introduced two years of free preschool education for all children. Investment at that age provides the best return and I am really glad that we prioritised that…

I thank the Deputy. Vision is one thing. I believe everyone in this House shares a vision about education. I have gone through some of the things we have done to widen access to education and to improve education over recent years. There is, however, a difference between vision and practical action. Practical action requires more than a motion of one or two pages. If the leaving certificate were to be abolished, the system of assessment to be put in its place would have to be set out so that people could judge whet…

I am sorry to hear about Tom's experiences and the issues the Deputy raised. As the Leas-Cheann Comhairle alluded to, however, these are specific allegations and they involve unnamed individuals who could perhaps be identified as a result of the comments the Deputy has made. I am not familiar with and I have not read the report the Deputy referred to so I am not in a position to offer further comment. I will let the Minister for Justice know that the Deputy raised the issue and perhaps she can engage or correspond …

I am sorry I cannot be more helpful on this matter. These are serious allegations. Any allegations that are made have to be investigated. People against whom allegations are made have the fundamental right to answer those allegations and to be considered innocent until proven guilty. That is why I would rather stray into this space, not knowing the specifics and not having heard from any of the people involved. I appreciate that the Deputy has tried to raise this matter through other means and has chosen to raise i…

The Central Bank already has extensive powers in this area. It can take action against individuals under its administrative sanctions procedure and fitness and probity regime. It can conduct an enforcement investigation into an individual, resulting in sanctions, including: a fine of up to €1 million; a requirement to pay the bank's costs for the investigation inquiry; and disqualification from working. The Central Bank can prohibit a person who is not fit and proper from performing any controlled function into the…

I do not know. The Deputy would have to ask every member of Government or we can try to find out for him. I have spoken to Pfizer and to Johnson & Johnson. These are companies that have big operations here so I have done that. AstraZeneca does not have a big operation here. I know the Taoiseach has sought to speak to the CEO of AstraZeneca but I do not know whether that has happened. Again, I cannot speak for the Minister for Health but I am sure he can speak for himself.