I am delighted the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, is here before us today because this is a hugely serious issue. I recently received a heartfelt email from one of my constituents, a concerned mother whose child is a patient at Temple Street hospital. In her message, she expressed profound anxiety regarding her child's well-being. She conveyed her utmost appreciation for the surgeon who treated her child, describing him as honest, professional and transparent in explaining both the possibilities and the limitations of …

The Energy (Windfall Gains in the Energy Sector) (Cap on Market Revenues) Bill 2023 is about putting limits on how much money electricity producers can make, as required by a European Union rule from October 2022. This limit will affect certain types of electricity production and will cover the period from December 2022 until June 2023. People are concerned because it took our Government almost a year to make this law while other countries did so much faster. It is hoped this new tax will bring in a lot of money bu…

I appreciate the opportunity to speak about the position of mayor of Limerick city and county and I acknowledge my learned colleague Deputy O'Donoghue, whose area we are talking about. I have serious reservations as to the costing of the mayor for the county. From where will the money come? Will the Government put up its hands and say it will fully fund the mayor for the five years of the term or will the local council have to pay? Obviously, the money is coming from taxpayers, so it has to be fierce accountable. G…

I am sharing time with my colleagues. Imagine someone who has just stepped onto the property ladder, finally owning a place to call home. Now picture this newfound security suddenly shaken by something the person has never faced before, namely, rising mortgage interest rates. For many in Ireland, this is a reality check they have never seen coming. It is causing many sleepless nights and making them wonder where this financial rollercoaster might lead. These rising rates are not just numbers on a spreadsheet; they …

Sophie Toscan du Plantier was brutally murdered outside her home in Kealfadda in Goleen - in the parish in which I live - on 23 December 1996. Twenty-seven years on, her death continues to enthrall the world but remains a blight on our island. Sophie's father is now 97 and her mother is 92. They and Sophie's son Pierre Louis want justice immediately in this case in Ireland. The French courts convicted a murderer in absentia . On 29 June 2022, An Garda Síochána announced what it called a cold case review. In the mon…

I welcome David Hall and Michael Burgoyne from the west Cork schoolboys' and schoolgirls' leagues, who made the journey up from west Cork today to the Gallery for the debate. West Cork boasts an ever-increasing footballing population, with a current active player register of 3,000, from under eight to adulthood. In recent years, the league has gone from strength to strength in terms of participation and success. Its academy recently achieved third place in the SFAI's most prestigious annual competition. To put this…

I have heard the Taoiseach has visited west Cork twice in the past two years. Last year he went as far west as my parish in Goleen, passing my own door on the way to Schull and last weekend he went to Bandon and Courtmacsherry. In contrast to the recent visit by the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, who is sitting next to the Taoiseach, my biggest regret is that the Taoiseach did not contact me about these visits as I would have welcomed him to west Cork and shown him the positive moves communities are making. I a…

I thank the Taoiseach for his reply. He does not seem to grasp the crisis I am talking about. He is always welcome to west Cork, one of the most stunning parts of our country. However, it is not Jurassic Park, where you drive in and drive out waving and smiling. We live there with the unfinished bypasses and those that have not been done at all. We live with no simple passing bays being built on the N71 or the R586. It is not going on for two or three years but for decades. The Taoiseach keeps mentioning one bypass…

It was reported at the weekend that the cost to the Irish taxpayer of taking unlimited numbers of Ukrainian refugees alone will be over €5.5 billion just to get us to the middle of 2024. To make matters worse the Government will pay €1.5 million of taxpayers money to the EU for its failure to accommodate asylum seekers with 350 international protection applicants without accommodation. This is because the Government failed to set limits on the number of migrants this country can realistically accommodate. The Gover…

When the Minister addressed the Seanad on 10 February 2022, he acknowledged that introducing a law to create exclusion zones outside abortion facilities would push up against civil liberties, yet he persisted in bringing this Bill before this House. In the same intervention in the Seanad he publicly admitted that he was rejecting the advice of An Garda Síochána that a Bill such as this was unnecessary. In rejecting the advice of An Garda Síochána, he thanked the abortion-supporting group Together for Safety for inf…

There are many reasons we have a housing crisis and we have put forward many of those in motions recently at every opportunity available to us. Planning permissions are a very significant issue, as are sewerage issues, where housing developments are being objected to and where county development plan decisions are taken out of the hands of councillors. All of these decisions are feeding into a very negative situation. The Minister of State even spoke last week here about the issue of honesty, in that we need honest…

We have been drip-fed information about the RTÉ scandal every day of the week for almost two weeks now. There are people in my constituency and all over the country who are rightly furious. We hear of wrong payments made to certain people RTÉ that have been going on for years. We hear of ticket purchases for bands at exorbitant prices and thousands of euro paid for flip-flop shoes, and on it goes. During all of this time, I have known a farmer in Rosscarbery on whose ground RTÉ has placed a mast to give service to …

We have very serious concerns about the Government's unwavering support for the EU nature restoration law, following a vote in favour of the drastic rewetting law at the June EU Environment Council in Luxembourg. The law, if implemented, includes legally binding targets that will have detrimental impacts on farmlands and the livelihoods of Irish farmers. The version of the EU nature restoration law approved by the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, and other EU Council memb…

I will move channel away from RTÉ for the time being to the issue of rural doctors and burnout. Dr. Fiona Kelly is one of the finest rural doctors in this country. She has been practising in the Beara Peninsula since 2009. She is dedicated to her job, is hardworking and almost always contactable outside working hours. She offers same-day appointments for anyone in need and still takes on new patients among those who move to the area because she realises that rural GPs are few and far between. She rarely gets a lunc…

It is no wonder that newly qualified GPs are emigrating as soon as they qualify. It is no wonder rural areas are suffering. It is no wonder GPs are closing their lists to new patients. What is the Taoiseach's solution to this crisis?

It is not.

Maybe if the Taoiseach had listened to my speech, he would know that they were extracts from Dr. Fiona Kelly’s social media. That is what I read out. It did not come from me. I say that to start with. Second, where are the GPs the Taoiseach is talking about? Obviously, the Taoiseach says that there might be more GPs, but we have a bigger population, too. That has to be taken into account. His answers today have given me no confidence whatsoever, which every rural doctor and the people of Castletownbere would have w…

If this were the case, the Castletownbere clinic would not have been forced to close last Friday. These are just a few solutions to a huge crisis. Will the Taoiseach work with the likes of Dr. Fiona Kelly throughout the country, or will he let such doctors burn out and close their doors?

As the RTÉ scandal gets deeper and darker, one aspect becomes clear, which is that RTÉ is a financial basket case that has been poorly operated and controlled from a corporate governance perspective. The organisation's top brass seems to have a cavalier outlook on providing anyone, including the Oireachtas, with the truth, yet the truth is what we seek. After all, for the period from 2020 to April 2022 alone, total TV licence and Exchequer revenue provided by taxpayers to RTÉ amounted to €456.8 million, with the or…

I will give 100% support to this Sinn Féin motion. I thank its Members for bringing it forward. The A5 route linking the North and South is a critical piece of infrastructure and a major route for people living and working in the Border counties and across the north west. The A5 route from Aughnacloy to Derry is in urgent need of upgrades to improve safety and reduce fatalities. I heard many stories through my office while other Deputies talked about the fatalities happening on this road. I give sincere sympathies …