I welcome the Tánaiste to the House, and I welcome the Bill. However, as somebody who has lived his life in the hospitality sector I am disappointed that we have to introduce a piece of legislation for the distribution of what is surely the entitlement of staff to their tips. I am disappointed that it has come to that. A minority of businesses are not distributing tips properly. A majority of us put our staff front and centre because we are a service industry. Without staff, the hospitality sector does not have an …

It has already been mentioned that the importance of broadband will be compared to water infrastructure, electrification and roads. When prioritised, broadband infrastructure is now maybe as important as road infrastructure, because if we can work from home, we do not need the road to take us to work. It has critical importance. Over the last two years of the Covid pandemic, we have identified broadband as a significant need in future, because it allowed a significant proportion of our workforce to work from home. …

I thank Senator Malcolm Byrne for his work on this, and Senator Wall for his previous legislation around illegal dumping. We all agree that it is a blight on everybody and on society. Senator Wall mentioned a rural area. Coming from a rural area, I can give the House example after example of dumping in the uplands. Wicklow started an initiative almost 13 years ago, the PURE project, protect the uplands and the rural environment. It has been massively successful. Senators should see how successful it is in Wicklow a…

I welcome the Minister and he has ten minutes in which to make an opening statement.

I am sorry for interrupting; the Senator is straying a little bit from the focus of the debate. It is very specific. The Senator is mentioning names. I know he said that-----

The Senator is straying into a very specific area.

This is a very broad debate in relation to agriculture and employment.

The Senator is putting forward very specific things around one sector within the agricultural sector.

It is not relevant to the thrust of this debate.

It is very specific.

It is not in the spirit of the debate, in fairness.

I am not taking that away from the Senator.

The Minister is not in a position to do so. As the Senator himself pointed out in his opening remarks, this is very specific. The Minister is not aware of it-----

-----and the Senator is not expecting the Minister to answer this either.

Senator Boylan has eight minutes.

I sat here through five hours of debate on the Finance Bill that involved very little about that Bill. We are talking about understanding my own sector and the impact of the employment wage subsidy scheme, EWSS, on seasonal hotels. I am not too sure if that was mentioned. We are also discussing what was announced yesterday regarding the potential closing time of 5 p.m. for the hospitality sector. I want it make it quite clear. Closure at 5 p.m. is closure of the hospitality sector by stealth. Asking the hospitality…

I want to make a brief statement on housing. We are in a housing crisis and we have to look at every avenue and opportunity to deliver housing. Part of the reality is we must deal with the private sector. In Wicklow, in the areas of high demand for housing, there is not one piece of local authority land. The local authority has no choice but to work with developers in order to deliver social and affordable homes. Nobody knows which is the better option. In fact, we might be getting better value for money from the p…

Sometimes it is hard to come here and listen to what is being said. I find the statements being made in the housing debate disingenuous. While Senator Gavan might not have mentioned landlords, when he mentions private rental tenants he is indirectly referring to landlords because one cannot have them without landlords. The Senator can come here and take the stance he has taken because he is not responsible. He just wants a political line on a video clip. We need landlords and what has happened with them in the last…

I am not disputing that.

We are heading into a debate on capital gains. Capital gains tax needs to be looked at from a supply of housing point of view. It can form part of the solution. There are thousands of properties out there on short-term lettings because they are better value for money for their owners. We would much prefer to have those properties as part of the housing stock. There is a case to be made that if we reduce capital gains tax to 20%, we could get a lot of disposal of assets, which would in turn make up the revenue loss …