I appreciate the opportunity to make a few remarks on the, once again, crucial European Council meeting. I will limit my remarks to just two aspects of the upcoming Council meeting because there are so many other aspects such as the rule of law in certain parts of central and eastern Europe or in our near neighbourhood that merit discussion but eight minutes is quite limited. The first issue is topical. It got quite a bit of attention earlier today during Leaders’ Questions. That is the expected roll-out of a Covid…

This morning, I raised the very concerning issue of a Derry-based bus company advertising shopping tours to Dundrum in my constituency in advance of Christmas. In light of the Tánaiste's responses to Deputies Gould and Lowry, does the Government have any plans to introduce regulations or legislation to deal with this extremely irresponsible online activity, which promotes something that completely goes against the guidelines that he has discussed?

I rise to speak in favour of the Minister's amendment to this Private Members' Bill. Before I do so, I commend Deputy Mairéad Farrell on presenting her first Bill. It is something that I hope to do in due course. It is not exactly Deputy Doherty's first Bill but I extend that to him. I was struck by Deputy Farrell's earlier contention in a Sinn Féin press release that Fine Gael and this Government have done nothing in this area. I remind the House that it was indeed a Fine Gael-led Government that introduced the Re…

What about the questions I asked?

I appreciate the opportunity to raise this matter. I thank the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform in advance not only for responding here but also for his responses to my parliamentary questions and letters on this issue. I hope he, along with the Minister for Justice, can tell how passionate I am about my proposal. I believe it involves a common sense approach to dealing with the plague of crimes affecting society and that will always affect it. In recent months, I have been vocal about an issue that is ve…

I appreciate the response of the Minister, including the written response and all the detail and acknowledge that the Minister's response focused on the Criminal Assets Bureau and its work. I have talked the point to death at this stage in respect of using cash seized by An Garda Síochána and the extra cash seized this year. I will leave that with the Minister for tonight but I will be coming back to him on this matter. I want to talk in particular about CAB and some of the obstacles raised and pointed out so eloqu…

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this important and timely debate. I thank the two Ministers present for their obvious commitment and factual work on this. I pay credit to my county colleague, Deputy Carroll MacNeill. She has contributed a great deal of time, professionally as well as politically, not only to the issue of domestic abuse but coercive control as well. It shows the power each of us have in the roles we hold. Unfortunately, when we are dealing with this topic we know we all have constituents …

I join with others in paying absolute credit to the work of An Garda Síochána, not just in recent months but over a long time, across all our communities. It is the absolute backbone of our community. The work it does every day to keep us safe is what we rely on to keep our society going. The most important point to come out of this debate is the uniform opinion of the House on the important role of community policing. Other Deputies spoke about geographic specific issues. I want to raise an issue, one which I have…

I am glad to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I truly welcome the Minister of State's very detailed analysis of this legislation. Many of us have been waiting quite some time for it to come back before the House. It is a shame that it fell in the previous Oireachtas, but we have finally got here. There are a few points I wish to make and a few concerns I would like to raise which are very similar to those raised by my colleague, Deputy Nash. I was very taken by the remarks of my dear friend opposi…

I am sharing time with Deputy O'Dowd. I welcome this Bill, although it is hard to welcome anything that arises out of such sadness of circumstances. None of the issues and legislation that we have debated concerning Brexit in the past number of years has been a positive thing. Brexit has needlessly exercised the minds and abilities of scores of civil servants, politicians and business people throughout the entire island. All of that effort was needed for what is an exercise in pointlessness and negativity. We in Ir…

It is difficult in five minutes to give a frank overview of the Bill, but like other Deputies, I will try to adapt one or two important points. I appreciate the Minister of State taking the time to take the Bill through the House. I welcome the Bill and the budget, which have clearly been crafted to face the two most difficult threats faced by our nation and economy now and possibly in our history, namely, Covid-19, a pandemic the likes of which has not been seen in a century, and the sometimes forgotten or occasio…

I will add to some of the questions asked, but perhaps with a slightly different tone. I thank the Taoiseach for the response given. I tabled the question specifically in relation to Northern Ireland and Covid-19 because they are the most pertinent issues of the day. I think it absolutely exposes something of a gap, going forward post-Brexit, of the Anglo-Irish relationship and of the Dublin-London relationship. There needs to be a formalisation of that relationship. We are very lucky that we are the only EU member…

I greatly appreciate the opportunity to speak on this matter this evening. I also greatly appreciate the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, being present for this debate. This is an issue that she and I have discussed at various fora in the past few extremely difficult weeks and months. I know this has been a particularly difficult week for the entire country as we deal with this rising pandemic and the new restrictions that regrettably but necessarily were introduced. I listened to quite a bit of the previous deb…

I thank the Minister of State for her reply and her empathy. When things are written in black and white they can seem so stark, particularly during a stressful time. It will be of some relief to so many couples and people that the Minister of State and her colleagues understand. I pay tribute to all our maternity hospitals for their work in keeping the virus out and being so supportive during this difficult time. I have a real difficulty with the term "reducing footfall". Birth partners should not be considered foo…

I thank the Taoiseach for his substantive response. I welcome the establishment of the shared island unit and the announcement last week by the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, and Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath, of a budget of €500 million, which is not an insignificant sum. The role of this unit is important not just in the post-Brexit era but now that we have the Executive re-established. We face so many challenges and opportunities on this island and this unit in the Tao…

I begin by agreeing with Deputy O'Callaghan on the vital point of rule of law. The last time we spoke about the European Council we discussed the position regarding sanctions against Belarus. It is extremely welcome that the Council has taken the decision not just to extend sanctions but, crucially, to include President Lukashenko in that sanctions regime. Some of the key areas touched upon by the Taoiseach, such as climate change but also the Union's response to Covid-19, are extremely important. While it is an is…

I had prepared some notes and I will discuss them momentarily, but I must take exception to some of comments made by Deputy Tóibín. There appears to be a misconception that Ireland and the EU are somehow separate. Ireland is the EU. We are discussing our European Council meeting next week. We are talking about an action taken in the Irish Government's name by the European Union, of which Ireland is an equal member. The Irish Government has played a proactive role throughout the Brexit process. Talk of cutting off d…

I greatly appreciate the opportunity to raise this issue today and I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, for coming to the House. This week the House of Commons intelligence and security committee released a report on the risk of terrorism in Northern Ireland. The report found that a hard border would be highly likely to lead to an increase in terrorist attacks and any border structure would be a target for such attacks. That is no surprise to the Minister of State, me or anyone who has been following discu…

I thank the Minister for his fulsome response and I welcome the comments made therein. I raised this issue earlier today at the Committee on European Union Affairs when the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Simon Coveney, was giving us an update on Brexit negotiations and preparation. I welcome the statement by the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Helen McEntee, yesterday at the Committee on Justice that a number of measures in the Department of Justice and Equality will be included in the Brexit omnibu…

I thank the Tánaiste for his address earlier and the great level of detail he went into. I commend the very many actions taken heretofore by the Government in co-operation with various State agencies as well as EU partners. Even though the work has been exhaustive, there will always be more work because it is very hard to wholly prepare for Brexit, particularly when we are at this very late stage in negotiations and we do not know exactly what form Brexit will take. It is providing much concern and indeed worry for…