I want to ask about Firhouse Educate Together secondary school. I previously submitted a written question about this issue. To cut a very long story for those parents short, there had been an agreement to start in September in Firhouse, where the school is located. What is being said now by the Department is that, because of the coronavirus, they will have to go to Citywest. I had an answer from the Minister to my parliamentary question today stating that the "Department is in on-going communication with the Patron…

Yes, please.

To follow up on Deputy Boyd Barrett's point I give the example of Tallaght Hospital, where consultant Dr. Anthony O'Connor has reported that the hospital is full. It is one of the hospitals that has no free beds between Covid and non-Covid cases. He has highlighted the heroic work done by staff there, including those who have answered the call to come home and help support our health service and society in its hour of need. He has pointed out that many of these staff are in the process of being thrown away. Junior …

The devil is in the "as many as possible" phrase, which determines whether these people are going to be just left-----

If we want to build a proper one-tier national health service, then we will need a lot more staff. I have another question which is topical. It is good that the advice of the Government and NPHET has become pro-face masks. It was unnecessarily delayed and confused but now it is pro-face masks and I welcome that. The 41% figure is, empirically from our own experience, very high relative to reality. We are far from that. A recent report, which will be welcomed by the transport workers' unions, states that making face…

The UN environmental programme was very clear that the bare minimum emissions reduction that we need to avoid catastrophic climate change is 7.6% a year. In reality, as a developed country, Ireland should be aiming for much more than that. The proposed programme for Government is full of fluff on climate change but it is empty of binding commitments to tackle this crisis in the next five years. As Extinction Rebellion said earlier today, it is simply not good enough and it should be rejected. On the core issue of r…

Last week the Taoiseach told the Dáil that nobody would be worse off than they were before the pandemic as a result of his proposed cuts to the €350 Covid-19 pandemic unemployment payment. That is not true. The Taoiseach has played with words in order to hide the reality of the cuts he is planning but the press statement issued by the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection last Friday and updated today is clear. It says: "For those whose prior employment earnings were up to €199.99 per week ... the …

I will quote the Taoiseach's words from last week in the Dáil: "The changes we are making tomorrow will ensure that those young people", referring to young people working part time before the crisis, "are no worse off than they were before the pandemic". That is the impression that the Taoiseach gave to people. He suggested that those people would not lose out as a result of the cuts and that is not the truth. The truth is that many people are going to be worse off as a consequence of the Government's decision. Som…

I also want to make an appeal to Green Party members not to go into government with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. If the Green Party allows itself to be used as a green mudguard for the pre-existing neoliberal and austerity policies of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, it will represent a substantial setback for the environmental movement. It will not be a step forward in any sense. It will not bring us any closer to the radical change we need to achieve a just transition to a net zero carbon economy. In fact, it will bring …

This debate is quite problematic. Huge numbers of parents of children with additional needs are watching and interested in this issue. They fight their whole lives for their children and they need to know what will happen with regard to the July provision. We have scheduled a special session of the Dáil to debate it and every answer to every question is that the Minister will reveal it on Friday. I do not understand why we are having this debate now if the Minister is not able to give us answers so we can have a ba…

I refer to the broader point that Deputy Gino Kenny raised about pupil-teacher ratios. Does the Minister accept that if schools are to operate properly in a post-coronavirus world or in a world where the coronavirus persists, the pupil-teacher ratio will have to come down, we will have to invest in our education system and we will potentially have to make infrastructural investments to facilitate social distancing, the safe operation of schools and so on? There is a coming together of the needs of children in schoo…

Other choices are available, outside the frame of reference of the Minister and Fine Gael, as to where resources could come from to enable us to do those things. They could come from the Apple tax and many other areas. I will raise a concrete question which illustrates a point about a potential post-coronavirus environment. The Acting Chairman, Deputy Lahart, mentioned Firhouse Educate Together secondary school, which has fought a long battle to get appropriate accommodation. It has received promises that it will h…

For more than two months I have been saying that we have been paying over the odds to private hospital owners like Denis O'Brien and are being ripped off. I pointed to evidence that suggests we are paying four times as much per bed as was being paid in the UK and I have repeatedly asked for a breakdown of costs. The Minister refused to publish those costs and instead tried to dismiss what I was raising as being some sort of conspiracy theory. On Tuesday at the Covid committee, Mr. Martin Varley of the Irish Hospita…

The Minister can talk about other issues if he wants to, and I will go on to talk about other issues. The reality, however, is that I have been looking for these figures for two months now. The idea that they are commercially sensitive in a context when all the private hospitals are in on the deal just does not seem credible. We have a situation where €300 million of public money is going to be handed over. To be clear, and I think the Minister knows this, it is not that I am against having these beds being part of…

From day one, members of the Defence Forces have got stuck in to help fight the impacts of this pandemic. They have transported PPE, helped with testing and tracing and much more besides. Like retail workers, cleaners and other essential workers, they have worked throughout the crisis, in many instances putting their health and lives and those of their families at risk in order to keep society running. Despite the remarks of the Minister of State, it is a fact that they receive shockingly low pay for so doing. At t…

I stated that that was the case at the start of the year.

I have another specific question I wish to ask the Minister of State.

If the Minister of State keeps answering it, I will not have time to ask another.

I wish to ask about the 116th Battalion. The Minister of State is aware of this issue. Will its members receive their full six months' overseas allowance in order that they will not end up out of pocket as a result of Covid-19?

I wish to raise three issues with the Minister, the first of which is not an area under his direct responsibility. However, it is an urgent issue so I will raise it with him now. I have written to the Minister for Justice and Equality about it and ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development to raise it with him as well. I refer to the conditions inside the direct provision centre in the Central Hostel in Miltown Malbay, County Clare. A series of very worrying reports about conditions inside the centre were…