It is Minister Chambers's Bill.

It is the Minister of State's Bill.

It is not his Bill.

I have put this question to the Minister, Deputy Harris, on a number of occasions in his role as Minister for further and higher education. It relates to the designation of universities or technological universities as centres of excellence for the purposes of teacher training education. As it stands, only a certain number of universities are sanctioned as centres of excellence. It means places like South East Technological University, SETU, are locked out of teacher training provision. I believe we could look to c…

I thank the Minister for her response. I am hearing a status quo response as opposed to the opportunity to change. The Minister will know this landscape well. For primary teacher education, you will be looking at the three colleges in Dublin or at Limerick. It is a little more open in terms of secondary school education. To be parochial about it - not parochial but regional - there are 600,000 people living within an hour of Waterford city and in the south-east region, yet there is no option to pursue teacher train…

The autonomy of the universities is one thing but this gateway around designation as a centre of excellence has effectively locked the likes of SETU out of this sector. Another aspect I draw the Minister's attention to is SETU's capacity to be a Gaeltacht university. We have a Gaeltacht in Waterford and an area where there is a real need is teachers teaching subjects through the medium of Irish. Our Gaelcholáistí are struggling to get their hands on suitably qualified teachers. There is an opportunity for SETU to s…

I move: That Dáil Éireann shall take note of the Report of the Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands entitled "Report on the progress of the Sustainable Development Goals 2023", copies of which were laid before Dáil Éireann on 7th December, 2023. I thank the Cathaoirleach of the Joint Committee on Social Protection, Community and Rural Development and the Islands, who allowed me as rapporteur to initiate our discussion on this report. The sustainable development goals…

I will pick up on a couple of the points made by Deputies Cullinane and Sherlock. This is welcome legislation. The Minister, in a relatively new Department, has made a habit of producing substantial and consequential pieces of legislation. I think back to the Higher Education Authority Act, which was an excellent and much-needed piece of work. The same applies to this legislation. We hope it will stand the test of time and it is worth reflecting on the pace of change in the research landscape. The first document I …

Over the course of the weekend a number of allegations surfaced relating to a small number of workers with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA. The allegations are serious in nature and I am in no way well placed to make an adjudication on whether they are well founded or otherwise but one thing of which I am absolutely certain – a view I share with Oxfam and 19 other NGOs – is that these services are a lifeline to people in critical need within Gaza. A collapse in financial support for these services…

There will be a large amount of repetition of the contributions made by the Minister of State and members of the main Opposition party. I echo what Deputy Paul Donnelly said about the pre-legislative scrutiny process in which the committee engaged. It was useful. One of the aspects that was most useful had to do with how there was a fair amount of anxiety when the heads of the Bill were produced. The session with the Charities Regulator was useful in teasing through those concerns. Many of the charities watching th…

A Mexican stand-off on Main Street in Celbridge. What is the Minister of State going to do to solve it?

The Minister of State has so far been on a tour of the country. He has been in the Shannon Callows and he has been in Celbridge. I will bring him to west Waterford and Deputy Buckley will shortly take him across the Cork-Waterford border to east Cork. I will bring him to a number of places in west Waterford, but I will begin with Tallow, County Waterford. There are just over 1,000 people in the town itself. It obviously serves a bigger population than that in the wider hinterland. It is a beautiful old town that us…

I thank the Minister of State. I know responsibility lies with Irish Water. However, as we have all experienced, we can make the necessary representations through the Oireachtas liaison channels but sometimes the focus of the Dáil on the issue helps to sharpen attention and that is what I hope to do this evening. The Minister of State did more or less what I did in my initial contribution; he outlined the problem and he identified where the problems are. The people of Lismore, Tallow, Cappoquin and Ballyduff are mo…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the motion and I commend the Tánaiste for bringing it before the House. It is a strong motion highlighting in explicit terms the scale of the violence, barbarity and inhumanity we see being played out before our eyes in real time in Gaza. The direct and indirect consequences on the lives of people who bear no blame for the atrocities commenced by Hamas on 7 October are unthinkable, from the bomb blast that blows a child's limbs apart to the amputation of damaged limbs without r…

Thank you, Deputy.

We will have the Minister without interruption.

Sinn Féin has ample speaking time on its own motion.

The party will have ample opportunity.

Thank you, Deputies.

It would be better for the conduct of the debate in general if Members could make their contributions without interruption.