I thank the Deputy for raising the important issue of Scoil Mhuire. I do not have an up-to-date note on the matter, but I will be speaking to the Minister, Deputy Foley, during the week and will make sure she knows he has raised it again. I will ask the Minister to come back to the Deputy directly.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 and 2 together. I recently attended the Paris international humanitarian conference on Gaza convened by President Macron. The conference brought together leaders from the EU and leaders from the wider Middle East region, along with high-level representatives of UN agencies and NGOs active on the ground in Gaza, to consider the humanitarian crisis and how best to ensure that civilians can access the urgent aid they so desperately need. The picture painted by those representing orga…

I thank the Deputies for their contributions. I have explained earlier on a number of occasions the Government's position on the ICC and also about the need to keep diplomatic relations open with Israel through its ambassador. Deputy Alan Farrell spoke about what we can do at an EU level. It is fair to say that the European Union is not united when it comes to the conflict in Israel and Palestine. It is such a contrast to where we are on Ukraine. A lot of that comes from the historical perspective that many of the …

I travelled to the Republic of Korea between 1 and 3 November, to participate in the team Ireland trade mission week, with the Ministers, Deputies Coveney, Harris, and McConalogue. This was the first team Ireland trade mission under the Government’s new trade and investment strategy and is a part of the Government’s commitment under the global Ireland strategy to increasing Ireland’s global presence and impact. This year is especially significant for Irish-Korean relations as it marks 40 years of diplomatic relatio…

The Pacific strategy, which Deputy Haughey mentioned, was launched by the Tánaiste quite recently. Our relationship in the region is flourishing, including at political level. We have already exceeded our target of €100 billion in two-way trade with the region. The world around us has been transformed in recent years, not just by the pandemic but by geopolitical developments. That is why the Government updated the strategy, renewing Ireland's level of ambition with more than 50 specific commitments. The cross-gover…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 4 to 6, inclusive, together. The Cabinet committee on Brexit and Northern Ireland was reconstituted as one of ten Cabinet committees established in January 2023. The Cabinet committee is intended to oversee the implementation of the programme for Government commitments regarding Brexit, Northern Ireland and ongoing related developments. Northern Ireland and related matters are also discussed at meetings of the Government and regularly bilaterally between me and the Tánaiste. It is e…

I thank Deputies Haughey, Smith and others who raised the Northern Ireland Troubles legacy Act. Once again I state the Government believes this is the wrong approach to legacy and reconciliation. It is not supported by any of the major parties in Northern Ireland, which is significant. We have received legal advice from the Attorney General. This is an essential contribution to our consideration on whether to take a case or to support a case taken by a third party. We are studying the advice, considering the next s…

I thank the Deputy for raising this really important issue, which affects tens of thousands of people around the country, including people in the Deputy's constituency and my own. As I have disclosed previously, I am personally affected, as are other members of the Cabinet. We appreciate that Government intervention is required. In some cases, people are able to pay the levy and in other cases they are not. Very often, in multi-unit developments, work is not done because some people are unable to pay, which creates…

We can all agree that there are a number of entities that bear responsibility for this - builders in some cases and other professionals involved in the construction business. The State also has a degree of responsibility, particularly pre-2014, when building regulations were not what they are now and were not enforced in the way they are now. Ultimately, while the State will pick up the bill for almost all of this work, the cost inevitably falls back on the taxpayer and the people. That is what happens in these sce…

I thank Deputy Bacik for raising this important issue. We can all agree, on all sides of the House, how valuable home care is. Most important, it provides older people and younger people who need care with the dignity they deserve in life. Crucially, it enables people to get out of hospital quicker, which frees up beds for patients who need them and enables people to avoid going into nursing homes. The length of time people spend in nursing homes has gone down considerably in recent years precisely because home sup…

We have never had more people working in our health service or public service than we have today. We have full employment in Ireland. That is a great thing but there are downsides to it, one of which is the fact that recruitment and retention are a challenge everywhere. That includes the public and private sectors, urban and rural areas, big and small companies-----

-----and well-paid and poorly paid jobs. It is an across-the-board issue when there is full employment and that is a challenge we face. It is a challenge I would rather face than unemployment, which affected this country for a long time. The new tender rate, which was backdated to July, is a core rate of €31 per hour for providers, which works out at an average rate of €34 per hour taking into account weekend pay, evening pay and premiums and travel rates. The national living wage is set at €13.10 and there is also…

The Government's position on this has been very clear. There should be a humanitarian ceasefire immediately so that aid can go into Gaza and EU citizens and other citizens can leave. Hamas should free all of the hostages it is holding without any conditions and should lay down its arms because it is a terrorist organisation. We need a new peace initiative in the Middle East, desperately so. The situation in Gaza is critical. The high number of civilian casualties is deeply shocking, in particular the number of chil…

There is also a young Irish-Israeli girl who may well be being held in Gaza as a hostage of Hamas as well. Let us not be just one-sided about this. Our priority, no matter who is holding them, is for Irish citizens to be able to get out and get to safety. That means we need to be able to engage with the Israeli Government and the Israeli ambassador. At some point we also want to be able to talk about peace, reconciliation and reconstruction. That may seem ridiculous now, but we have to keep that hope alive. While e…

It would not cause Israel to change course. Second, it would hamper our efforts to get the hostages out and to get citizens out and also to potentially have some sort of role in future peacebuilding and peacemaking in the area.

Our advice and understanding is that we do not need to make a referral for an investigation to take place. The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has said that he believes jurisdiction applies to the occupied territories but I will seek further information and advice on that. There are roughly 8,000 EU and foreign nationals in Gaza. Only a handful have been allowed to leave so far. Only about 20% of EU citizens have been allowed to leave so far and we have been given no indication that Ireland is someho…

I have always been a huge supporter of the tourism sector and industry. I got to work very closely with it for three years as Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. I have continued to engage with it and I really find people who work in the tourism sector to be among the most hospitable and welcoming people, and among the best businesspeople we have in the country. I will never forget that in the 2011-12 period after the financial crash, three sectors lifted us out of that recession, namely, the multinationals,…

I am happy to clarify that I have not called for a curb on international travel; far from it. That is not my position whatsoever. I said that we have to take account of it and that some journeys are more valuable to the State than others. I have given the Deputy an example of exactly that. I also said we need to make sure we move towards sustainable aviation fuels. That is the future. The future, for me, is not stopping flying. I do not want to stop flying either, by the way. The future is a move towards sustainabl…

We agree that an immediate humanitarian ceasefire is required. The killing has to stop. Hostages need to be released. Citizens of other countries need to be allowed to leave and we need to make sure that we get humanitarian aid into Gaza as soon as possible. The Government is not proposing any specific sanctions at this point. We know when sanctions work. Sanctions work when they are done on a multilateral basis. Sanctions done unilaterally generally do more harm to the person imposing the sanctions than the entity…

There are an estimated 8,000 foreign and dual nationals and immediate dependants in Gaza who are seeking to leave. Evacuations are being managed on a country-by-country basis and it will take time for this process to be completed. The names of all Irish citizens in Gaza who have asked to be included on the list of those to be evacuated have been submitted to the relevant authorities. We do not know when they will be able to leave. There will be no evacuations of foreign nationals from Gaza over the weekend. Our emb…