I thank the Minister of State for his response. I appreciate and welcome all the supports that are available to the wider student body. However, we need a targeted bursary for student nurses, who have additional incidental costs that would not ordinarily apply to other students. It is not a case of one or the other. The supports that are in place are, of course, welcome and necessary, but we should always be open to adjusting or increasing them. This is one such instance in which we must accept and embrace the fact…

I thank the Acting Chair. I ask him to remind me when I have spoken for six and half minutes. I am glad to have an opportunity to make a few points on Brexit and business. I am from the north west of the country, as the Minister knows. Sadly, many businesses in my region are concerned about whether they will make the Brexit deadline in business such is the impact of Covid and our dependency in the north-west region on the hospitality sector. I will come back to that. In the context of budgetary preparations and wit…

Deputy Farrell and I are sharing three and a half minutes each, unless there is any time residue left over from the previous speaker. I imagine we would happily use that too. I thank the Minister of State for the opportunity to address this Bill. I welcome the legislation on the whole. We badly need to address the long backlogs from concerned communities, in terms of appeals that are awaiting outcome, and the forestry industry. For the first time ever, the industry is in real danger in terms of continuity of supply…

I think this is my first opportunity to congratulate the Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I wish her very well in her post in the years ahead. I am glad to have the opportunity to make a few points on the Bill. Obviously, it is to be welcomed in the sense that, as the Minister said, it deals with some housekeeping matters relating to the operational command issue, which makes sense, the extension of courts martial where necessary provided they are looked for within the initial period, and the recruitment of former members to…

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Naughton, for standing in for the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, whom I understand is isolating, and rightly so. I would appreciate it if the Minister of State could provide an update on the national broadband plan. In response to my Question No. 781 of 16 June 2020 the Minister, Deputy Ryan, said that 115,000 rural premises would be connected by the end of this year, with 70,000 to 100,000 per year connected the following year. Can the Minister of State confirm that a contract h…

I thank the Minister of State for the response on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan. I appreciate this is not her direct area of concern but I mentioned specific areas in my earlier contribution. They include Cornhill Business Park and Mr. Philip Rooney, who asked me to raise this matter. They also take in Mr. William Doogan of MCM Spirits and Liquers at Erneside Business Park. Councillor Justin Warnock raised the issue of the Four Masters national school in Kinlough and the Strandhill community development…

I wish the Minister the best in her tenure in this Department. I would be delighted if she had the Department of Rural and Community Affairs on its own because it is the kind of Department that requires someone with her expertise and commitment. I regret that in the division and reallocation of Departments, we have overloaded some of them with very important issues and the Minister's is one of them. I wish her the best of luck and we will try to help her as best we can. I welcome this Bill, which puts the pandemic …

Last week, I raised several issues regarding State borrowing by the Football Association of Ireland, FAI, in circumstances where there are governance questions to be answered. Since then, I have done as the independent chairman of the FAI asked in his late night statement of last week, and checked my facts and find not only that I must stand over my comments but that other serious governance issues and questions arise. On the question of the independent chairman's authority to sign the memorandum of understanding, …

I do not wish to cast aspersions on the good name of the independent chairman of the FAI or anyone else but I am bound by my duties to the taxpayer. These are serious issues. Significant State funds are at stake and clearly the independent chairman of the FAI has significant questions to answer and so too does Sport Ireland. The essence of the independent chairman's role is ensuring that decisions are made in a proper, open and effective way and in accordance with due process and good governance to the exercise of …

He has a fiduciary duty to the FAI when he is on that board and, at the same time, he is the one providing the money from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The Government should reverse this. In fairness to the former Minister with responsibility, Shane Ross, I did not agree with him much but I agreed with him on blocking that appointment in January.

I thank the Ceann Comhairle and wish all of the new Ministers well in their portfolios. It is nothing personal; this is business. As the Minister knows, the memorandum of understanding, MOU, with the FAI is a Shane Ross production. His ghost is very much alive as we see. It was very much drawn from the same ether as his failed judicial appointments Bill, where he wanted everybody under the sun to be independent without the appropriate expertise to run the show. Naturally, as a Parliament we prevented that proceedin…

To clarify, privilege is a vitally important rule within the House and sometimes it must be used. I mentioned nobody by name but as State funds are relevant to this, I am well within the rules to highlight the three people in question. Absolutely there are no aspersions about them as individuals, without prejudice to them or to impugn their good characters in any way. However, their appointment and how it was carried out was beyond what I would call good governance.

It pains me to say it, but the Minister has gone native already. There will be no change and the former Minister, Mr. Ross, is enjoying the irony out in the leafy hills of Enniskerry. The MOU says that the offer of the Minister should in no way be regarded as a binding commitment in the context of a contractual agreement etc. and the MOU will be underpinned by a series of relevant legal documents. The reality is State funds, some €212,000 per month since January, have been given to the Aviva Stadium in the name of …

I am grateful for the opportunity to make a few points about finance initiatives that are needed to support business. There has been much talk over the past number of months about the need to support small business in particular and the talk has been encouraging from all sides. We now have a Government in place. Indeed, it was remiss of me not to wish the Government well and wish the Minister of State, Deputy English, who is with us this morning, and all his colleagues well and Godspeed in their very difficult job …

I wish to make a few points on this important issue. The Minister quoted some statistics. He said numbers have been going down week on week since May. I do not know who compiles these statistics but the lived experience of women is not reflected in them. From speaking to my local domestic violence advocacy service, which is one of 39 associated with Safe Ireland, I learned it had a steady number of calls during the lockdown period. In May, however, when there was a relaxation of the restrictions, there was an explo…

In terms of the contribution of the OPW to climate change, obviously much needs to be done. I need to talk parochially, in terms of my own constituency. I ask the Minister to comment on some contributions by the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Flanagan, about a fortnight ago in answering to Deputy Feighan, my constituency colleague, about Sligo Garda station. As the Minister knows, it was part of the Government’s plan to build a new station there, to the extent that it paid €1.35 million for a site. Last …

With the Acting Chairman's permission and, indeed, that of the Minister, I will bank my questions and he can reply in writing in the interests of efficiency so that everybody gets in. It would be remiss of me not to ask whether the Department has been in contact with the boxing authorities throughout the world to register our abhorrence in the words of senior members of the Judiciary of a crime organisation that has caused many deaths and much harm throughout Ireland and, indeed, the rest of the world being associa…

I am sharing time. I will take five minutes, leaving two and a half minutes each for Deputies Cathal Crowe, Christopher O'Sullivan, O'Dea and Ó Cuív. I am thankful for the opportunity to say a few words on the matter. Our transitioning, in terms of lowering of transport emissions, has been an abject failure so far with an increase from 2017 to 2018 of 1.7%. Transport accounts for 20% of overall emissions and 39% of energy-related emissions. We are at a crisis stage. We have been very slow in our procurement of alte…

With the permission of the Ceann Comhairle and of the Minister, as on the previous occasion, could my questions be logged and responded to in writing because it will save time and use our time here most efficiently? It is certainly timely that we are having this debate. As we know, aviation is critical to the economy. In some reports, Dublin Airport and our airports generally are responsible for up to €12 billion to our economy in terms of direct jobs in aviation, suppliers and indeed the enabling of tourism and as…

I am going to use my brief few minutes to make a couple of points and the Minister of State's officials might email his response to me at a later date. Considerable sacrifices have been made by local authorities all over the country. I commend all the workers in local authorities who have helped in the front-line effort throughout the Covid crisis. Recent grant schemes are very welcome but, sadly, we are doing little more for the SME sector than, effectively, subsidising next year's rates bill. Will the Minister of…