First, I would like to support Deputy Kerrane on that. We touched on the issue of the regulator during last week’s debate. Having a regulator without teeth is the same as not having a regulator at all. We have seen the operations of some large conglomerates, particularly over the past 20 years. I highlighted in the past in this Chamber what happened to the farmers and the people who were involved, for example, in the production of vegetables in Ireland. There was a phoney price war where some conglomerates started …

As a follow-on to my earlier contribution, I recall one very late and cold night protesting with others at the gates of the factory in Bandon, and also above in Limerick. Having listened to those people and taken away conversations we had that night with the producers of beef, I have a fair question to ask the Minister. There is no harm in asking this question. He is bound to have an opinion and I would love to hear his answer to it. Does he have confidence in the system we have in Ireland today of price setting - …

What about protecting people and farmland?

I want the Government to give a commitment that the OPW will continue its legal obligation to maintain the arterial drainage programme that is instrumental in protecting active farmland, communities and, importantly, people’s homes. We have seen in the submissions to public consultations on the river basin management plan that NGOs in this country which are armed with €5 billion of taxpayers’ money, such as the Sustainable Water network, SWAN, which is made up of 25 environmentalist groups, such as An Taisce, Bat C…

I thank Sinn Féin. The only criticism I have of it is that Deputy Cullinane should have said at the start of this debate that he was pulling the motion. He should have collapsed the Dáil this evening over it and had the screens go blank. I will tell the House why. He should have done so because it is the height of disrespect to him, his party and the work its staff put into bringing this motion before the Dáil that the Minister for Health is not here. Think about it. We are debating hospitals, waiting times and wha…

I thank the Independent Group for tabling this important motion. I thank the Minister for visiting Kerry last week and I appreciate that he visited the site of the new community nursing unit in Killarney. It will be an important unit, a fact I wish to highlight to him. The motion is timely. We can all agree that the health service is not in good shape. The system has more than 830,000 people on waiting lists, up from 550,000 when this coalition entered government. In overall terms, the Government's ineptitude is th…

I wish to start by thanking a number of people. I want to thank people like Ms Vera O'Leary and her staff, the excellent people who work in the Kerry Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre and who have given guidance, help and assistance to people in different types of distress over the decades. I also want to thank the people in the ADAPT refuge in Kerry and all the people who work in the services. I also want to thank members of An Garda Síochána for the kindness they show to people at times of trauma in their lives after …

I commend an excellent report in the Business Post by Lorcan Allen, Daniel Murray, Killian Woods and Catherine Sanz on energy, housing, water and planning and how Ireland is on the brink with regard to those basic essentials we need. The common denominator in our failure in energy, housing, water and planning is the Green contribution to this Government. The sooner Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael wake up to the fact the Greens are going to drive us all into the ground, the better. Look at the nonsensical proposal that ca…

It was said they should instead park miles out of town and make the last bit of the journey on a bicycle, walk or try to get a bus, if they are able to.

It is absolutely ridiculous, and the sooner somebody calls it out for what it is, namely, insanity-----

I am not going to be shouting at the Minister because I want to work with him. I want to try to reach a solution whereby we are all working together to ensure people are able to have homes, whether that is through people building homes for themselves, the local authority building them or private people who want to own properties and rent them out. We must try to have a mix. The shouting and roaring of the Opposition has failed and the workings of the Government have failed, so we need to look at this in a cold, har…

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, but what if it is a fact? If a person in TII-----

-----writes a horrible, poisonous letter against a young, respectable person who is seeking planning permission and states that that individual should not have the right to have his or her entrance on the road, I say to hell with the person in TII and their dirty, horrible letter. I ask the people in TII to do something more important, namely, build bloody roads and bypasses, modernise our road network and give up sticking their noses into planning permission. I want to talk about cabins being built, whether they a…

What did I say wrong?

I ask the Leas-Cheann Comhairle to tell me what I said wrong.

I said it was horrible-----

-----and that it was sticking its noses into other people's business.

I stand over that.

I said it was horrible and I said it had a poison pen.

My late father always said you can say whatever you like if you are telling the truth.