Some of the challenges we have relate to our waiting lists. I noted Deputy Cullinane was talking about those for children earlier on. I got a couple of parliamentary question responses back this week. At the moment we have 8,832 people waiting on primary care psychology. Of those, 7,849 are children and 3,777 of these children are waiting more than 12 months for treatment. There are 302 children aged five years or under waiting more than a year for an appointment. That is almost 20% of their lives they have spent w…

I was extremely disappointed by what the Government provided for mental health in this year's budget. It has provided just €24 million in additional funding. This is a decrease from the additional €50 million that was provided last year. This is woefully inadequate and shows the Government is out of touch with reality. It has not recognised the mental health challenges ordinary people are facing. The Minister of State, Deputy Butler, announced an additional €47 million, which is still down on last year, yet the Min…

Earlier this year, I accused the Government of making announcements on additional funding for mental health supports as window dressing just to create cheap headlines and it gives me no pleasure to find out that I was right. They were not even cheap headlines; they were free headlines as the €10 million announced in additional funding for mental health supports in February remains unspent. This is not good enough as there is a complete lack of urgency on the part of the Government to provide the mental health servi…

This was emergency money and it is now eight months later.

I too thank People Before Profit for bringing forward this important and timely motion. We are facing a winter of discontent, but it must not be a winter of disconnect. Global gas prices have climbed to the highest levels in more than seven years. There are external factors that impact on the wholesale price of gas and electricity in Ireland, but the Government needs to put measures in place to reduce the effects those external factors have on citizens. Government charges, including carbon tax, make up 16.2% of ele…

I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak about the national youth justice strategy. I put the question: what is youth justice? In a real republic, youth justice would be seen to be giving all the young people of this island an equal chance to reach their full potential but in a State that has known nothing but flip-flopping Governments of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael for more than 100 years, many of our young people just never had a chance. Policies that are designed to limit the opportunity of young people are li…

As my colleague, Deputy Cullinane, said, when the Covid outbreak first began and restrictions were introduced in response to the emergency, there was a lot of political unity because we did not know what we were dealing with and we were all pulling in the same direction. We agreed with some measures introduced by the Government, but there were times when there were disagreements and we challenged that when debates where allowed. We challenged the Government the last time the emergency powers were extended. At the t…

It will be removed in October. That is fine. I appreciate the Minister responding to me on this point. If this measure is removed in October, the powers will still remain in place until February 2022. It is similar to the powers in this legislation in that there is no need for them.

This brings me back to the mood of people in the State and that they are feeling lifted. When we extend emergency powers like this, the fear that people have is that such powers are being extended because they are going to be used. This is why we will not support this proposal.

Temperatures are due to drop and the basic needs of some children are not being met. Heat is very important. We had an impassioned and emotive debate on child poverty in the Dáil this week, which brought up the matter of the basic needs of children such as food and heat not being met. Electricity, fuel and gas prices are surging. If someone loses his or her job today and he or she has to go on jobseeker's benefit, he or she is not entitled to get fuel allowance for the first 13 months. Will the Government look at t…

In the limited time I have I will focus on just one issue relating to the Housing for All plan. Over the last weeks in my area of South Dublin County Council there have been over 60 25-year leases available for people on the social housing lists. These are private homes that were bought on the market and leased back to the local authority. Investment firms are buying these homes on the private market and then leasing them back to the local authority for big profits. This is another barrier to first-time buyers who …

I thank my colleague Deputy Cullinane for tabling this important motion to tackle the hospital waiting lists. It is shameful that almost 900,000 citizens of this State are languishing on waiting lists just to get the treatment they need at this very moment. It is good to see the Minister of State responsible for mental health present. I am my party's spokesperson on mental health. We are all aware that early intervention is key in a child's development. The latest figures I have on waiting lists indicate there are …

I welcome this opportunity to speak on the report by Dr. Niall Muldoon on child poverty, A Better Normal. One of the themes in the report was housing and child homelessness, which is a big issue. Whether it is children who are living in the box bedroom with their mothers and fathers or families that are separated because of high rents with the father living in his family home and the mother living in her family home and the children being separated, there is a wide range of issues around child homelessness. I am th…

I was really happy to be able to co-sign this Bill. I thank Deputies Paul Donnelly, Ellis and Munster for bringing it forward originally. Looking around the Chamber, one can see the issue of scramblers in public spaces is a big issue in my area in Dublin Mid-West, particularly in Clondalkin and Lucan, because three Members from different parties who represent that area are here this evening to talk about it. I took a walk along the canal that runs between Clondalkin and Lucan earlier today. It is an amenity I often…

-----when we did everything possible to go into government and Deputy McAuliffe's party decided not to have a conversation. Fianna Fáil is a party of exclusion. It excluded more than 500,000 people in the State from that conversation. He can dress it up any way he wants.

This is what we are doing in opposition. We said we would be the most effective opposition in the history of the State, and that is what we are doing. We are offering solutions in respect of real problems that people are experiencing. We are putting things in place that will improve people's quality of life.

I urge those on the other side of the House to allow this legislation to go through. The Minister of State, in his feedback, engaged in pre-legislative scrutiny. If there are problems with the Bill, that is what pre-legislative scrutiny is for. The Government should allow it to go into pre-legislative scrutiny and we will have the debate at that stage. It should not stop the legislation at this stage for the sake of it.

I thank the Deputy for that.

This technical Bill implements the new Garda operational model and it removes the district model replacing it with Garda divisions. The problem is that the Bill could move An Garda Síochána further away from the model of community policing than ever before. Sinn Féin consistently highlights the need for more community-based policing. We have seen the numbers of community gardaí decimated under successive Governments, particularly in Dublin. For example, community gardaí in Dublin have seen their numbers decrease fr…

The Government announced with great fanfare that it was increasing the requirement on developers to provide social and affordable housing under Part V of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended, from 10% to 20%. This would see the provision of affordable homes double for those desperately waiting for them. Taking it at face value, one would be right in thinking this was a good deal for ordinary workers and families. However, like many announcements from the Government, it is very difficult to take it at f…