I want to state clearly that reforming the triple lock is the right thing for Ireland, Irish neutrality, the men and women of the Defence Forces, our peacekeepers and Irish security and sovereignty. The determination to secure Irish sovereignty is how we are all here today and how we are elected to this Chamber and represent an independent country. I am disappointed by how disingenuously the Opposition persistently frames this discussion. The Minister clearly articulated the proposed legislation from the Government…

I take this opportunity to raise awareness about lipoedema. As Deputy Sherlock said, one in 11 women or girls has it. That is one member of your camogie or football team or two in your leaving certificate class, at least. That is how significant this is. I know the Minister is a huge advocate for women's healthcare. I joined her yesterday in Tallaght hospital for the national women's strategy. We really need to see a strategy and path forward for how we will raise awareness among the public and medical professional…

I would like an update on the review of the 2001 planning guidelines for local authorities on early learning and childcare settings. It is 25 years since they were set out and a lot has changed in our society, in our childcare needs and in best practice for childcare. Will the Minister of State provide an update on the review of these guidelines?

As the Minister of State may be aware, and no doubt he is, the cost and availability of childcare are two of the biggest issues in our society. It is certainly an issue in Deputy Currie's constituency and it is very much an issue in my constituency of Dublin Rathdown as well. We have lost 64 providers out of core funding and, in Dundrum, the wonderful provider Once Upon A Time has also withdrawn from core funding. This is causing increased pressure on the system and highlights the challenges in the system. These gu…

I am glad to hear about the nature of the viability of facilities because, unfortunately, one of the issues that is occurring is that as developments are put in place they provide facilities for childcare but it is often an empty shell. It is not necessarily fit for purpose for that particular community. We also have the issue, particularly in already dense urban areas where apartment developments are going in, of increasing the level of the local population when we do not have the childcare spaces to meet the dema…

This legislation seeks to ensure that AI transformation is guided by key principles, namely, safety, accountability and trust. We must also ensure that we extend those principles to the transformation AI is having on higher education. AI can, of course, supporting learning but it can also produce essays and other assessments. Now we have AI tools to help us detect AI-generated assessments. This has resulted in a weird arms race, with increasingly sophisticated AI tools to generate assignments and increasingly sophi…

Today, I will speak about AI in higher education and specifically the impact it is having on staff in higher education. AI is often talked about as a double-edged sword in education. There are benefits for students with personalised learning, continuous feedback and delivery of education through multi-media. Students have different learning styles and now we can deliver education in different ways to suit them. However, this is putting increased pressure on staff. The staff are not getting the same benefits from AI…

I welcome this Bill. While it is a short and technical Bill which we are talking about today, it is also quite significant because it indicates the seriousness with which this Government is treating the need to overhaul our transport infrastructure. I represent Dublin Rathdown and from Stepaside to Stillorgan and all the various townlands throughout my constituency, including Ballinteer, Cabinteely and Dundrum, I regularly hear from commuters struggling with cramped Luas carriages, ghost buses, disappearing cycle l…

I wish to raise with the Minister of State today the issue of urban broadband. The national broadband plan has been hugely successful. It committed to connecting more than 1 million people to fibre broadband. When it was being proposed and introduced, it received a lot of criticism for its level of ambition and cost. Several years later, though, we can see how successful it has actually been, with more than 450,000 premises connected and another 492,000 premises available for preorder already on order. However, it …

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire Stáit for his reply. He mentioned a couple of things in his response about market failures, which is what the national broadband plan sought to address. I would argue that what we are dealing with here in all of the areas I highlighted in Stillorgan, Foxrock and Cabinteely are market failures. They are, to use the Minister of State's own terminology, "gigabit service-challenged areas". People cannot work from home in these areas. The current service is completely insufficient. I welcom…

Many speakers have highlighted various gender gaps across Ireland. However, there is another gender gap I wish to highlight, namely that relating to transport. We are investing heavily in sustainable transport - nearly €600 million across the four local authorities in Dublin - to build various active travel schemes. This figure could reach €1 billion by 2030. Of course, we absolutely need to invest in sustainable transport. This is essential in order to hit our climate targets for public health and also to make sur…

In 2021, the postmaster in Mount Merrion in the Stillorgan local area closed. It is a familiar story. The postmaster was moving on, An Post advertised and nobody stepped up to take on the role. We were lucky in the community to have two other local post offices a 25- or 30-minute walk away. Last month, one of those closed. It was the same story. The postmaster moved on, it was advertised but nobody took on the role. We are still quite lucky as we have one local post office. This one is in Stillorgan village. The vi…

I want to ask the Minister about how we can support the night time economy by seeing if he is engaging with both public and private transport providers to try to extend operating hours later into the night.

I thank the Minister. I appreciate the feedback on that and that the Minister is engaging with the rail operators, Transdev and Irish Rail, about trying to extend rail services. I represent Dublin Rathdown, which is a constituency adjacent to the city centre constituencies. An awful lot of my constituents raise the point with me all the time that they would go into town more often if they knew that they could get home. We are within a distance from the city centre that it should be easily accessible and affordable.…

I listened to the Minister talk about the constraints in the system. It would be remiss of me not to refer to some of the communications I have received this week about our wider transportation service. Hannah was in touch with me about the No. 11 bus route in Clonskeagh. Three full buses went past her on one day, and this has happened repeatedly. She has spent hundreds of euro on taxis. Three buses went past Catherine from Leopardstown, going down the N11. In Kilternan, which is one of the fastest growing resident…

Hear, hear.

As the Minister of State has been hearing, the rainfall we have had in recent weeks - it was raining when I was coming in here today, so we may not be past it yet - has caused considerable damage to homes and businesses, including in my constituency of Dublin Rathdown. This intense rain flooded areas including Clonskeagh, Nutgrove, Benildus Avenue, Aiken Village in Stepaside and Cookstown Lane in Kilternan. The local wastewater systems were completely overrun. Those whose homes had not been damaged by the floods fo…

I am taking this question on behalf of Deputy Peter Roche. Has the Department examined the impact of the current means-testing arrangements for the SUSI grant for those applicants who continue to reside in the family home and thus have to be assessed on their parental income? Obviously, the number of people in this situation is rising, potentially, because of the housing crisis. Has the Department engaged with the Department of Social Protection regarding potential reforms to these arrangements?

According to the Skillnet Ireland talent report for 2025, 58% of businesses report that they have difficulty in attracting required skills. There is a huge opportunity for society and for the individuals themselves in people reskilling and upskilling, thereby contributing more to society and improving their own lives. However, we are effectively putting barriers in place, preventing people from engaging in this upskilling by not enabling them to fully access all the supports that would be available to them were it …

I acknowledge the improvements that have been made to the various schemes. The overall scheme does not take into account how the world in which we are operating has changed. We are now in a world where people are expected to engage in lifelong learning. People return to education, then go back to work and then return to education. We need to demonstrate our support for that. As we know, we are also facing a housing crisis. As part of that, we are changing the rules to allow modular homes to be built on the site of …