One child who does not have a school place is one child too many. While I do not know the background to the individual case, as far as I am concerned, that child should be provided for. I know the Minister will agree with me it is within the capacity of the Department of Education to provide for that child. I do not have the details of the case, but if the Deputy wants to share them with me afterwards, I will see what I can do.

The Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage has received that report and published it. The Government is going to consider intervention, just as we have in other areas like pyrite and mica, to which we have made very substantial and comprehensive responses. The response will be equally comprehensive on this front as well.

I will talk to the Minister for Health about the proposal the Deputy has made regarding specific sections of the Bill. Deputy Grealish is suggesting we accelerate changes to aspects of the legislation in advance of any comprehensive overview of the Act, as I understand it. I will talk to the Minister about that.

Yes.

First of all, as part of our response to the cost-of-living issue, we waived all fees for the school transport scheme. The measure is saving families up to €650 and the Deputy calls that a mess.

It is saving families €650 and the Deputy's response is that it is a mess.

Some €280 million is being provided. More than 124,000 tickets have issued-----

That is an increase of 21,000 over last year. That is good news. There have been challenges with the scheme but the bottom line is that we did not hang around here. There was a cost-of-living crisis and we said we will move to reduce it for families and get rid of the fee, and we did. Of course, this created issues this September-----

The Department is working and Bus Éireann is doing everything it can to process applications and issue tickets as soon as extra buses and drivers are sourced.

The alternative would have been to do nothing.

I am familiar with the issue. I thank the Deputy for raising it. I am acutely aware of the anguish of parents of children with cystic fibrosis and their eagerness to see this drug made available for their children. There is ongoing dialogue between the HSE and Vertex, the drug manufacturer. Efforts are ongoing to ensure that this drug can be made available to those 35 children currently being excluded from it. We were involved in earlier campaigns and got it through, and we are anxious to get this sorted as well. I…

The Deputy has raised an important issue. The Mental Health Commission is there to make sure proper standards are applied across the mental health arena. On the registration of the mental health care and recovery approved centre in Bantry, the commission made a recommendation or decision that should be reduced from a total number of registered beds from 18 to 11 due to its concerns over the size of residents' bedrooms in the centre. The Minister of State, Deputy Butler, has requested a detailed report from the HSE …

With regard to the Deputy's budget recommendation, I know the Minister with responsibility for housing is working on all these issues. The Government must consider a whole range of measures. I will certainly present the Deputy's perspective. It is one that others have put forward as well.

First of all, I disagree with the Deputy's figures.

Leaving out special transport, an extra 21,000 tickets have been issued over last year. That is significant. There are pluses to what has happened. If we did nothing, we could have managed the existing numbers and left everything alone but we were anxious to reduce costs for families, which are significant. A figure of €650 for many families is a significant reduction in the cost.

Again, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform is very much aware of this issue, which has been longstanding over the years but is now gaining particular importance because of the new public service pay agreement that is being concluded by the Minister, which is welcome, and also with the Building Momentum agreement. There had been an agreement prior to Building Momentum with regard to the larger section 39 organisations. Again, just like every pay issue, there has to be a process to work out the issues. The…

I appreciate the Deputy's consistent raising of the situation in the public domain. It is a very difficult and tragic situation when a child is forcibly removed from its mother in that context. I do not know the full background of the case in its entirety. Normally, we would not perhaps discuss it in a public arena but the Deputy has to raise it and I appreciate that. Normally, our consular officials work with families overseas who have challenging issues and difficulties and so on and represent them. We have a deg…

I agree 100% with the Deputy. We do need such a campaign. The Minister is going to launch a communications campaign in relation to energy demand reduction, but I think the Deputy has outlined a very good list, one that we should work on as a country. Irrespective of the crisis, we need to move much more quickly in terms of reducing our dependency on fossil fuels in particular and move as fast as we can on the-----

I do not doubt what the Deputy is saying in terms of the cost of childcare, particularly how it is higher in certain locations than others, but it is high across the country generally.

Yes, but I am just saying generally. There are a number of mechanisms by which we can intervene depending on the type of care involved in looking after a child in whatever context. In the last budget, we focused primarily on trying to get better working conditions for those working in the childcare arena. Thankfully, in the past two weeks, an employment regulation order has been agreed, which will lead to an increase in pay and conditions. The next phase will be the upcoming budget, where we will have to look at af…