We all have our own views on budget 2022. Of course, the Government Senators, as is their right, will speak about the positive aspects of the budget yesterday, whereas there are others of us who believe it was a confetti-like budget. There is a serious question mark about its capacity to make any dent in the very serious rental crisis we have in this country, the childcare affordability crisis and the health waiting lists. Time will tell who is going to be proved right on that analysis of the budget. There is an is…

Some of us had seating problems yesterday. Please, let us not cast aspersions.

Over the past eight weeks, I have had reason to meet a considerable number of apartment dwellers in the area of Dublin Central where I am based. They live in apartment blocks which were built in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and over the past three to four years, they have had to come to terms with the horrendous reality that they are living in units that are effectively fire hazards, and units that are riddled with construction defects. Despite the impressive exterior of many of these apartments, behind that the…

On behalf of my Labour Party colleagues I thank Senator Boyhan for bringing this important Bill forward. I understand this is the fourth time that this Bill, or at least the concept contained within this Bill, has come before the House. I read back through some of the transcripts of those previous debates and, as other Senators have said, there is cross-party support for the concept within this Bill. However, the Oireachtas has failed on every occasion to progress it. As a House we need to look at ourselves and ask…

I wish to mark International Safe Abortion Day and acknowledge the significant number of people who turned out on Saturday for the annual March for Choice. Notwithstanding the enormous progress we have made since the historic referendum three years ago, we still have significant issues regarding the delivery of abortion services in this country. While the Government's review is welcome, I urge the Government not to delay publishing and progressing it. The establishment of safe exclusion zones has been a long-promis…

I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House. The Labour Party is very happy to support this Bill. It is being taken at a time when there are very real question marks about the capacity of the aviation sector to recover. Projections suggest that it will be 2024 before it recovers, if at all. The desirability of that recovery is a very separate but important question about how to have a sustainable aviation sector that sustains thousands of jobs and an even wider tourism sector. We need to ensure that secto…

I am delighted the Minister is in the Chamber today. As she knows, families and children who depend on school escorts know the importance of that role in ensuring children can go to school in a semi-independent way. School escorts are low-paid workers and many of them have to engage in other work to supplement their income. Often they are special needs assistants, SNAs, or in other work. It has only come to light in the past fortnight to three weeks that the impact of circular 0024/2021, which was issued last April…

I thank the Minister for her reply. I am most relieved to hear that the issue has been identified and acknowledged within the Department. My only question now concerns the fact that by the time the new circular is circulated and implemented within schools, a number of weeks will have passed. It needs to be ensured that no school escort is out of pocket from the beginning of the school year. I am seeking that reassurance form the Minister.

I express my sympathies to our colleague, Senator Annie Hoey, and her family. Just a number of short weeks ago we were congratulating her on her wedding. Thankfully her father, Ray, was able to attend it but after a very long illness, he lost that battle last night. The issue I raise this morning is one that many Deputies, Senators and other elected representatives from north County Dublin have been most anxious about over the past number of days, namely, the leak last Sunday in respect of MetroLink and the prospec…

We in the Labour Party welcome this Bill and I thank the Fianna Fáil Senators for bringing it forward. As we have heard from a number of accounts and from reading the LRC report, stalking is a deeply insidious and appalling violation of a person's dignity, safety and security. I pay tribute to Una Ring, Eve McDowell, and, indeed, Senator Keogan, for sharing their stories. This is a welcome Bill but it is important to say, particularly to the Department of Justice, that this ask is not new. The Dublin Rape Crisis Ce…

I extend our best wishes to Senator Norris and we hope he will be back in full health in the autumn and in here with us. Senator Boyhan used the lovely phrase of a “Leinster House family” earlier. I also express my thanks to all those involved in ensuring that we can operate here day in, day out. I thank the Cathaoirleach for his great encouragement and especially to those of us very new to this Chamber. I also thank the Leader for all her work this year. I am shocked to hear about the broadcasting unit and I very …

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire. I am certainly one of the people who is very worried about the current infection numbers, where they will go and the possibility that restrictions in some other form will need to be reimposed. That is shared by many in the community. Alongside that worry is the sense that for workers, young people, those living on their own and families, we must now start to learn to live with Covid-19. Looking at this Bill, there are three very clear reasons I and my party are very deeply concerned abo…

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire. The Labour Party will be supporting this legislation, as we did in the Dáil. It is a technical amendment to the 2019 Bill to extend the existence of the tribunal. This in itself is unobjectionable. We will not be found wanting in ensuring those who want to go through the tribunal can do so. I must express frustration, however, as have others, that this Bill contains no attempt and makes no effort to resolve the reasons so few women have come forward. It almost seeks to extend in the hop…

I am speaking to amendment No. 22, which seeks to delete section 58 of the Bill. Time and again, as we have heard this afternoon in this Chamber, we hear about the importance of the role of local authorities with regard to city and county development plans and all the other great work they do. The reality for many of us who have sat on a local authority, however, is that very few powers are available to the councillors and elected members of local authorities. Section 183 is one of those powers. Senator Gallagher m…

On behalf of the Labour Party group, I thank the Cathaoirleach, the Leader and everybody else for their congratulatory words to Deputy Bacik. I know she would be very touched by all the kind words and messages from Senators from across the Chamber on Friday, over the weekend and today. It is, of course, an enormous privilege for her to have been elected as a Deputy for Dublin Bay South. It is also a privilege for the Labour Party. Deputy Bacik leaves behind the Seanad which she dearly loved and of which she was ext…

I thank the Minister of State for coming into the House. We all need to recognise the necessity for the extensions contained within the Bill as they relate to the EWSS and the CRSS. In that context, we would have been minded to support the Bill were it not for section 13 and the railroading of section 14 into the Bill, which means we cannot support it. Before I deal with those sections I want to refer to the extension of the EWSS and the CRSS. For many months we have raised the pointed exclusion of non-rateable bus…

I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House. We in the Labour Party are also pleased to be supporting this Bill. I thank the Minister of State for engaging with the members of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment and providing us with a briefing on the Bill a number of weeks ago. We have seen two very serious challenges to workers’ rights infrastructure in the State this year, the first of which was the prospective finding of unconstitutionality in the workings of the WRC in …

Last week, we saw the culmination of 80 years of work in the OECD with the reaching of an historic agreement for fair tax competition across the developed and developing world. However, the Government decided to stand apart from 131 other countries by not supporting the agreement in full. There are serious questions for the Government, to which we need answers in this House. We need to know what is its strategy. Hedging our bets and waiting to see what will happen in the US Congress is a dereliction of responsibili…

I also very much welcome the Bill. At its heart is an amendment to the principal Act to broaden the list of those who are regulated under that Act and to ensure that the category of enforcement guard will be included on that list. I very much welcome section 4, which is the amendment to section 26 of the principal Act. It is important that the PSA can take action with regard to officers of the private security companies operating in the sector. The integrity of the sector is enormously important. Much has been said…

Is the Senator pressing the amendment?