The budget for the HSE this year provides for it to take on an extra 16,000 staff. Never, in any one year before, has the HSE had the authority or budget to recruit so many additional staff. I hope that includes the hiring of some of the staff in Wexford mentioned by the Deputy. I will ensure that the HSE is aware that he raised the issue today. On the issue of assessments of need, the Government acknowledges that these assessments are happening far too slowly. There is provision for additional staffing. There will…

The Government is open to proposals for new legislation in this area. We are already in the process of updating the legislation on incitement to hatred. Potentially, the updating of that legislation by the Minister for Justice may provide the vehicle for new and stronger laws in this area.

I am afraid that I am not familiar with the particular school mentioned by the Deputy. However, I absolutely agree that there should be proper consultation with the parents, the student body and the board of management. I will let the Minister of Education know that the Deputy has raised the issue in the Chamber and I will ask her to respond to the Deputy directly.

I will certainly do that. I will inform the Minister and the Minister of State that the Deputy has raised the issue of the school in Kilcloon in the Chamber today. I will ask them to engage directly with the school.

I thank the Deputy. All of us in this House acknowledge that the cost of housing in Ireland is far too high, particularly for those who want to buy their first home. Those costs are very high relative to people's incomes. That is particularly so in the cities, especially in central Dublin to which the report referred to by the Deputy relates. I note that the whole premise of the Deputy's question was to compare the housing record of my party in government with his party's record. It is fair that we do exactly that.…

For anyone who decides to write or review this debate, the record should state that it was the Deputy who got personal, both towards Deputy Eoghan Murphy and me. It was the Deputy who was partisan, attacking Fine Gael, my party, by name rather than talking about the Government. It is important that is recognised. Having been personal and partisan, it is only fair that I should be allowed to stand my ground and defend myself as a person and defend my party and my colleagues.

The fact is that the Deputy's party, Sinn Féin, has been in government for 13 of the past 20 years in Northern Ireland. It has been in government on this island longer than my party has in the past 20 years. Sinn Féin is a party of government, an establishment party north of the Border. When it comes to social housing, its record is not good. It built fewer social houses in Northern Ireland in recent years than we have added to the social housing stock south of the Border, certainly since 2016. Sinn Féin increased …

Sinn Féin also opposed the help-to-buy scheme, which has helped thousands of people to buy their first home.

You need to take something to calm down. You are a very angry man.

I thank the Deputy. I welcome the constructive suggestions that have come from the Labour Party in recent weeks. He is right; neither the Government, the Opposition, any government, NPHET nor any expert has got everything right when it comes to managing this pandemic. What we all hope is that when this is over we will have been seen to have got most things right most of the time. I know the Deputy does not like the term zero Covid. Labour is proposing a different strategy, which is that of aggressive suppression. I…

We may well end up in the same place. There are many things that we have done in the past year to fight this pandemic that I never thought we would do. The Government and I will always keep an open mind on these things. We may not be as far apart as people may think. When we have a discussion like this, in slogans, it misses the detail. This is the complexity of what we have to deal with and there are a number of things that we will have to do to defeat the pandemic. There is no silver bullet or single action that …

Nobody should say "permanent". No matter what strategy one has, there is the risk of having to reimpose lockdowns. Unfortunately, we have seen that.

We have seen that in Melbourne. People want to know that whatever we do is going to be sustainable.

I thank the Deputy for raising this matter. In terms of the overall picture on hospital capacity, everyone acknowledges that we are doing so much better now than has been the case for a very long time. January is usually a period when our hospitals have no spare beds and when we hear every morning about hundreds of people being forced to spend some of their hospital stay on trolleys. As of today, for example, we have 400 to 500 beds free across our system. There were 121 patients on trolleys this morning but mainly…

People have good reason to be afraid. This pandemic is real. There are 3,000 families across the country who have lost loved ones and are still grieving for them. Had it not been for the actions that people took individually and as a community, as well as the actions that Government took, we would be experiencing much higher levels of mortality and sickness than we have now. At least until we have a critical mass of the population vaccinated and we develop new treatments, there are reasons for people to be afraid. …

I thank Deputy Harkin for raising this issue because I know it has been a topic of discussion among the general public and among healthcare professionals over recent weeks. The issue was previously raised by Deputy McNamara so I looked into it. As everyone in the House knows, many Irish people are deficient in vitamin D, not least because we do not have much exposure to the sun, a situation that is now worse than ever because people are unable to travel to sunshine destinations. There is evidence that vitamin D may…

I again thank the Deputy. As I am sure she will appreciate, notwithstanding my background as a doctor, I am here as Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment and do not wish to dispense medical advice as to which supplements people should or should not take. As the Deputy stated, there is evidence that vitamin D can be beneficial in the context of Covid-19 and there is very little evidence that taking supplements of 25 mcg per day does any harm. We have asked NPHET to examine the matter and to give…

As the Deputy will know, we now require that anybody entering the State to have a negative PCR test. If people do not have such a test, they are subject to mandatory hotel quarantine. We are examining a change which would result in a requirement for two tests, five days apart. This is recommended by NPHET and we are giving it full consideration. We will make a decision in that regard quite soon. This is the model used in Iceland where two tests are required, five days apart, with quarantine in between. That may wel…

-----to republican funerals. I know the Deputy does not organise them but-----

-----the attendees are his party's people, members and supporters. The Deputy and Deputy McDonald have to tell people to stop these funerals. They are a bad idea.