The Minister of State is welcome to the House. This is an issue that affects many rural communities, but especially those in my county of Clare. There has been underinvestment in wastewater facilities there for decades under all Governments. There are many pockets of County Clare where development is precluded simply because there is not proper wastewater infrastructure. We are in a situation where in Broadford village the planning regulator altered the Clare county development plan and dezoned land because the inf…

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Heydon, very much. I know he is only delivering the message on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. Reading between the lines, it is quite worrying because the expert panel that was appointed, which has evaluated all of the projects, could turn around and recommend that none of the projects should receive funding. What will happen then? Is the Minister going to override the decision and come up with his own justification for providing the funding? The situation is ve…

I welcome the Taoiseach to the House. In my capacity as health spokesperson for Fine Gael, one issue that predominates discussions on a regular basis is family carers. People who give up their careers to look after loved ones find themselves in a situation in which they do not get paid for it is not acceptable in a modern society. We need not just to radically overhaul the whole means test element associated with the carer's allowance but to eliminate it. If people are doing a job that is essentially saving the Sta…

Well said.

I am conscious the Acting Chair is giving me time, so I am not going to delay. There are three issues that need to be addressed. First, we need a campaign to remind drivers of driver behaviour. Unfortunately, many accidents are caused by drivers breaking the rules of the road, not taking their time and not observing simple and decent driver behaviour. Second, we need to engage with the rental car market to put devices in vehicles to alert people when they stray over to the wrong side of the road, as people from Eur…

I would like to be associated with the tributes to Flor O'Mahony. I did not know him but his reputation was one of dedicated public service. I would also like to pass on my sympathies to the family of Damien O'Reilly. I attended his family last Thursday, as many in the House did. I knew Damien, initially through Senator Davitt's office and through working with Senator Davitt. I subsequently got to know him well by meeting him at various different functions. He was bright and capable, and a committed public servant.…

I join the Acting Chairperson in welcoming the students from the UCD Politics and International Relations Society, of which I am an alumnus. It was a great society then and I am sure it is a great society now. The Minister is extremely welcome to the House for the debate on this long overdue and vitally important legislation. We have a situation in this country whereby people can record members of An Garda Síochána as they are doing their job, while gardaí do not have the right to record others. There is something …

I amplify the compliments Senator Garvey paid to Frank Gunter. I know Mr. Gunter and everything the Senator said about him is true. I welcome two guests in the Gallery, Sasha Cannonkadu and Zara Carlyle, who are both fifth-year students. Sasha’s mother is a Fine Gael councillor, Punam Rane. I have no doubt, having engaged with and spoken to these two young people, that our future as a country is in safe hands.

They are from Blanchardstown and Clontarf.

I thank the Senator for raising a very important issue and for the great work she does as chair of the Oireachtas committee on dementia.

I sincerely thank the Minister of State for giving his time this morning to respond to the Commencement matters. It is much appreciated by the House.

Like everybody else, I thank Mr. Martin Groves and all the staff in the Houses of the Oireachtas for their ongoing courtesy, decency and hard work in supporting the work we do. I have a couple of issues. I raised a number of months ago through a Commencement matter the long-awaited and committed to pilot sewage schemes from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. It was going to identify at least one scheme, if not two, in a number of west of Ireland constituencies that have been waiting for decad…

I, too, welcome the Minister of State. I know how busy he is. His presence here is appreciated. This matter is a simple one. I have provided the details on the applicant as additional information. It has to do with registering of births. This couple were abroad when the child arrived prematurely. The mother is from Australia and the dad is from Ireland but they are living in Ireland. The child was born abroad and they are going through the process of registering the birth with the Department of Foreign Affairs in o…

I thank the Minister of State for the reply. The child was born on 27 December 2022 in Malaysia, and on returning to Ireland, having got the documentation from Australia, the couple engaged in a process of applying to have the child's birth registered. We are talking about, I would imagine, the end of January, so we are talking about four or five months. The problem is that obviously the child has no passport, and the child is not in a position to apply for a passport, so they cannot travel until such time that the…

The Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Ossian Smyth is very welcome to the House, and I thank him for his time this morning.

I thank the Minister of State for his time today. We appreciate that he is very busy.

I pay tribute to Brendan Daly who passed away overnight. He was a former member of Seanad Éireann, and a former Deputy, Cabinet Minister and junior Minister. Brendan served the people of west Clare with distinction in these Houses for more than 30 years and from every position, from Cabinet right down to being a Member of this House on a number of occasions. He will be remembered for much of the work he did for individuals in County Clare, people who went to him for assistance and always met an open door in Cooracl…

I welcome the Minister of State.

I thank Senator Wall. I thank the Minister of State for her time here in the Seanad this afternoon. Our next Commencement matter is that of Senator Seery Kearney. We will wait for the Minister of State, Deputy Thomas Byrne, to arrive.

I thank the Minister of State very much for his time and I thank the Senator for having raised this matter.