I propose Senator Seán Kyne.

I echo what Senator Carrigy said. It is an opportunity for us to acknowledge the tremendous work that is being done all over the country by the Civil Defence. As we speak, my home town of Listowel is inundated with a flood that is probably biblical. This follows on from a similar one-in-500-years flood experience in Tralee at the weekend. We also had some very serious car accidents in Listowel over the weekend. All of the time, it is the Civil Defence who are called out. I take this opportunity to agree with Senato…

Like many Members I am sure, I attended a briefing by the Irish National Teachers Organisation, INTO, held across the street this morning. If anyone has not gone there yet, I recommend they do. A very large turnout of teachers from all over the country was present. Among the many valid points raised, one particularly stood out, which was that in 2009, a great number of posts of responsibility in primary and special schools were suppressed due to the banking crisis. This meant a lot of extra work fell upon the shoul…

I welcome the Minister of State. He and the Cathaoirleach will know that the Companies Act 2014 is a very important document. I was a Member of the Oireachtas when it was passed by these Houses. It was very well teased out and was passed after robust examination. The matter I wish to raise relates to sections 216 and 217 of the Act. These sections relate to the rights of citizens to access the company register of a limited company by guarantee and the recourse available in the very rare occurrence of a company fail…

I thank the Minister of State for a comprehensive response, which I will obviously study. I certainly will not hesitate to take his advice regarding the ongoing review. I have emailed the CEA in respect of this matter but, to date, I have not received a reply. Perhaps I sent it to the wrong address, but I will certainly renew my attempts in light of what the Minister of State said.

I thank the Minister of State.

Senator Dolan has six minutes. She is sharing time with Senator Currie, but she can use the six minutes if she wishes because we are ahead of ourselves.

We will keep an eye on it.

That ends our discussion. Before moving on, I add my compliments to the young political activists in the Visitors Gallery for bringing this to the fore. Even though they are not of my persuasion, as the great poet Macaulay said, on occasions like this: And even the ranks of Tuscany, Could scarce forbear to cheer. That is a Latin tag and they might want to look up that one.

When is it proposed to take Committee Stage?

Is that agreed? Agreed.

The Tánaiste is welcome. I apologise for being out of breath. I was stuck at another meeting and could not get away. I also left my notes behind, but I will do the best I can. It is great to see the Tánaiste here. Along with his Cabinet colleagues at the time, he certainly played a major role when the Good Friday Agreement was being drawn up. Everybody who played his or her part in bringing the agreement about deserves great credit and respect. I include all parties in that. At this time, I think, in particular, of…

Yesterday there were calls for a debate in the House on the Arab-Israeli conflict. I want to support those calls. It is time that we have a reasoned, logical discussion in the Chamber about the ongoing war between Palestine and Israel. It is fair to say that the narrative on this conflict has been almost entirely one-sided, pro-Palestinian, in these Houses and in this House, particularly from the opposite benches, where it is seen that there is only one good side and one bad side. If we in Ireland have learned anyt…

I cannot hear what the Senator is saying.

It amazes me how people on the left associate so much with Palestine, an area where there is no tolerance whatsoever of divergence in opinion, whether it is sexual, social or otherwise. I believe deep down that there is a strain of anti-Semitism involved. We saw that recently again in the British Labour Party and it is a reminder of the bad days of Jeremy Corbyn when Jewish people were constantly being harassed by so-called left-wing liberal people. A debate is long overdue, which I hope will be balanced and logica…

I will refer briefly to the excellent figures released yesterday on the Government surplus position. American financial newspapers have today made the point that Ireland's budget surplus is now the highest of the 27 EU member states. It is almost unprecedented at a time when many other countries cannot get into a credit situation. There are lots of reasons we are in this happy state, not least the prudent decisions made by the current Government and by our Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael McGrath, and his prede…

I was at a meeting recently at which the question of NGOs came up. A person in the audience asked what an NGO is and as a public representative, I did my best to explain. It led to an interesting discussion and what came across to me was that the general public do not know much about NGOs, how they operate, who they represent and how they are established. There also seems to be concern that there is duplication, and I know about that from my experience on Oireachtas committees over the years. If an issue comes up, …

I have heard Fianna Fáil described as lots of things but I have never heard us called a sister party before.

There is a very good article in today's edition of The Kerryman newspaper by a top journalist, Dónal Nolan, highlighting the plight of local communities trying to get by with the help of community employment, CE, schemes. This has been raised many times and we all know the CE schemes are a vital part of the social fabric of rural Ireland in particular. They keep local development and local endeavour going, whether it is cleaning graveyards, maintaining local football pitches or, as in the case of Ballylongford in n…

This ageism needs to be looked at. There was an excellent seminar organised here during the week by my colleague, Deputy Lawless. I ask the Leader to commend the Minister on highlighting the shortage of women on boards. However, cutting people out at the age of 70 is pretty brutal and callous and does not make sense.