The Minister is defending the indefensible and he knows it. He is defending cruel, barbaric practices. He is defending the organised killing for human entertainment of a tiny minority of foxes. Then, he tries to do it in such a way as to suggest that it should not be divided along urban and rural lines, having two minutes previously said that this is a "wedge issue" that is "designed to be emotive and confrontational", and that there are many other rural activities we would like to ban. On the one hand, the Ministe…

It explicitly does not. It is hunting - fox hunting. If the Minister has a problem with the-----

It is about fox hunting. That is what the Bill is about. People can go and read it online.

If the Minister had a problem, he could come back and sum up by saying, “We agree with a ban on fox hunting, but we have a problem with some of the wording and the way it is done”. That is no problem. What would happen is it would be passed on Second Stage and amended on Committee Stage. The point on the ban on trail hunting is there precisely because this has been used in Britain as a way of continuing undercover or underground fox hunting. However, no ban is specified and we support the possibility of the continu…

Yes.

It is.

The badgers have nothing to do with it. It is a waste of money.

That is nonsense. There are loads of papers on this.

The Government is wasting our money-----

-----on killing badgers.

That is absolute nonsense. It is not badgers. It is a waste of public money.

The Minister of State is going to sell them out on Mercosur.

You are out of touch.

As the gap between the votes is less than ten, given the importance of this matter, that this is about women's health and is about simply restoring a Bill to the Order Paper that already had passed Second Stage in the last Dáil, I am asking that we vote by means other than electronically. I ask people to look at their consciences and even shift from a "No".

Under Standing Order 88(3)( b ), I propose that the vote be taken by other than electronic means.

It has been three years since the completion of the Shannon report into sexual abuse of children at St. John Ambulance. It is a harrowing report which concluded that the organisation had failed to act against the perpetrator for years, despite, "a significant degree of organisational awareness of the risk that he posed to children". One of the central recommendations of that report was that the national safeguarding officer be independent, specifically to counter what was described as a cultural deference within St…

I move: That, pursuant to Standing Order 205, the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) (Amendment) Bill 2023, which lapsed on the dissolution of the 33rd Dáil, shall be restored at Order for Committee Stage and notice shall be published pursuant to Standing Order 37.

I move: That Dáil Éireann adopts the Report of the Committee on Standing Orders and Dáil Reform entitled, "Rota for Leaders' Questions pursuant to Standing Order 38", copies of which were laid before Dáil Éireann on 12th December, 2025.

Does the Taoiseach think there is any national security implications for the significant decline in basic civil liberties that is happening in Britain, such as the proscription of organisations of Palestine protestors like Palestine Action, the denial of the right to a jury in the vast majority of trials and what is happening with the Palestine protesters who are charged with nothing more than property damage and who have been held for over a year without trial and without access to bail? The consequence is there a…

I would like the Taoiseach to present some evidence. He said the circumstances are suggestive-----