I listened intently to the Taoiseach's response to Deputy Boyd Barrett yesterday when the Taoiseach said he did not believe every trade deal the European Commission engaged in should be put to a referendum. Does the Taoiseach believe Mercosur should have to be ratified by individual parliaments or by referendums, or does the Taoiseach believe the Commission should be able to ratify that directly without consultation with national capitals' parliaments?

Under Standing Order 54, I can ask that a Minister, including the Taoiseach, be compelled to answer a question. My question is, should national capitals' parliaments have to be consulted on Mercosur or can they be bypassed?

I can also ask for a direction of the Chair under Standing Order 54.

I am asking for a direction of the Chair.

The Taoiseach did not answer the question. I am asking the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for a direction.

I am asking the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for a direction.

I am asking the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for a direction that the Taoiseach did not answer the question.

I join others in saying it is good to see the Ceann Comhairle back in the Chair. I listened with intent to the debate. Many spoke about famous scientists from their areas. We heard a lot about Robert Boyle. I was surprised not to hear about William Parsons. Maybe I did not listen closely enough. Something they have in common is Robert Boyle was the seventh son of the Earl of Cork and William Parsons, who developed the Birr leviathan, an interesting thing which I saw on a school tour, was the Earl of Rosse. For a lo…

To add to what my constituency colleague has said, in addition to their loyalty to their group, there is a tremendous sense of loyalty to their local community and the community has a sense of loyalty to the fire service. Not many people in Clare even realise that there is only one full-time fire officer in County Clare and everybody else is part time, with the vast majority of them retained firefighters. There is an increasing professionalisation and it is increasingly difficult to get a mortgage. What worked very…

I wish to return to an issue I raised previously with the Tánaiste, which is the poor rate of maternity benefit in Ireland compared to other EU states or other OECD states. In Ireland, the average proportion of previous earnings that maternity benefit accounts for is 25.2%. It is one of the lowest rates in the OECD and the EU. During the pandemic, people were coming off pandemic payments of €330 per week and being reduced to €250 because they had just had a child. That is a penalisation of women for having children…

Sometimes we forget about people not in the public service.

I wish to share time with Deputy Pringle.

I am not going to take anything like ten minutes. I had an opportunity to look through the Bill. Like many previous speakers, it seems to me that many aspects of the Bill are quite confused and confusing and perhaps ill-thought out. The Long Title demonstrates to some extent the purpose of the Bill. [A]n Act to amend the law relating to the prohibition of incitement to violence or hatred against a person or a group of persons on account of certain characteristics…and to provide for an offence of condoning, denying …

Is Deputy Pringle not next?

From the outset the Taoiseach has stated that the environment is very important to his premiership, and the influence of the Green Party in government is well known, but one area that has not permeated down to is the new agri-environment scheme. The Taoiseach will be aware of the BurrenLife programme. If he has not been photographed there, he is unusual as a Cabinet Minister. Certainly, the Minister of State, Senator Hackett, and the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, have been there. It is not within their area of respo…

I appreciate that.

I listened to the Tánaiste’s reply earlier that he is determined to increase wind energy by 2030. International investors hear that, they come to Ireland and they leave shortly thereafter shaking their heads. When will the marine area consents be granted for phase 2? What are the criteria going to be? Will power-to-X be included in that or will it not? Because international investors are completely in the dark as to what the Government's plans are, they simply do not hang around. They leave and invest in Scotland, …

I doubt that will help either.

Despite the problem dereliction presents across the entire State, there were only 1,415 sites across the whole State on the derelict sites register of the various county councils at the start of this year. No property was compulsorily purchased in 17 counties last year and no levies were levied by 14 county councils. The Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage has introduced a grant scheme to do up derelict houses. That is very welcome but someone cannot buy a house unless it is for sale. Does the Taois…

I have a fundamental problem with this Bill, because the purpose of it is to transfer responsibility for a series of failures of government over decades onto the private sector and, in particular, onto a small group in the private sector who are less well equipped to bear the burden of that than another group in the private sector. Before I was elected to this Dáil, I worked as an adjudicator in the Private Residential Tenancies Board, PRTB. In that time, I was shocked by the standard of tenancies in which people w…