I feel strongly that we should use this time with the Minister to try to get over the line something that has been raised with me by numerous women as impacting their daily lives, so I was disappointed by Senator Warfield’s intervention. We all speak about the difficulties in the healthcare system. I did so on radio last night. I would love to see a new cancer building in University Hospital Galway, and we are working on that. However, I did not use the opportunity of this debate to raise other issues. Neither did …

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I am delighted to have the Minister of State in the Seanad. I am fed up, as no doubt every other politician is, with the state of school transport in this country. It is an absolute outrage, to be honest, that the Department of Education has been sitting on a report on school transport since 2021. I rise today specifically to deal with one issue in Galway around the Educate Together national school in Newcastle. For years, we had a bus service from beyond Moycullen – families in Rosscahill are affected as well – bu…

The Minister of State's response has outlined numerous other problems with school transport which highlights the absolute urgency in getting this report. We are now in December and we will be lucky to get sight of it before Christmas. It will end up having taken more than two years to get a report to tell us what we basically already know which is that school transport is a bit of a joke. People are given an allocation of a school bus and nobody shows up to drive the bus. I am frustrated but I am nowhere near as fr…

This matter does not relate to the Minister of State’s Department but I hope she will have answers for me. I thank her for being here. This is to do with community energy. Two community energy projects are in jeopardy now, in Galway and Mayo. It is fantastic that we have community energy for the first time but it does not work if there are State bodies, such as ESB Networks, holding projects up and actually could in fact be the cause of these projects not being able to go ahead. The two community-owned solar projec…

As already outlined, we need these projects to go ahead as soon as possible in light of the debt and financial issues associated with their not proceeding in a timely manner. One of the issues I have is that there is an enabling grant of up to €180,000 per project through the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI. No community project of which I am aware is in receipt of that enabling grant. Therefore, we have situation where they were effectively promised something under a two-year timeline, and, through n…

The Minister is very welcome. This is a piece of legislation we have all been looking forward to in the Seanad. The real reason vapes are so much in our face and that we smell them when walking down the street is due to a cynical attempt by the tobacco industry to find new markets for itself. Our children are the people who not just the industry but, indeed, governments have been letting down. It is now our job, as the Government, to put a stop to this. As in my children's school, vapes are a huge problem for the e…

I move: “That Seanad Éireann: recognises that: - menopause is known to be a challenging period in the lifetime of every woman, no matter when, during that lifetime, it occurs; - it is a turning point for women, not just reproductively, but also can come with a range of biological and psychological symptoms that can lead to vasomotor conditions, cardiometabolic disease, neurological disorders and mental health problems; further recognises that: - hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is a recognised treatment for many o…

I will say at the outset how lovely it is to see the Minister of State in the Chamber for this really important day. This is World Menopause Day and it is kind of coincidental that I am bringing forward this motion, which is about free hormone replacement therapy, HRT. However, it is also a really good opportunity for us in this House to speak about the importance of women's lives and the fact that 50% of the population is going to hit the menopause. Some people are impacted and some are less so, but recognition mu…

The Minister of State has given me huge confidence that we were not far off, when we came to our conclusions that this would cost the State very little. All the things she pointed out indicate this is only a little more than what is already being done, but would be something that would have a deep impact. The Minister of State spoke about the women's health task force. It has been set up for a relatively short period. While a huge amount has been achieved in the past few years, it is difficult to tell somebody who …

I welcome the Minister. I thank the O'Farrell family for meeting with us last week and I thank Senator Doherty for organising that and for inviting me as a representative of the Green Party. I know the family have also met with my colleague, Tate Donnelly, in Monaghan, and we have sat down and had a meeting so that I understand the full details. As many others have said, I offer our deep sympathy. It does not matter how long ago it is; I understand that the pain is still being felt. The entire purpose of an inquiry…

The Minister of State is very welcome. It is great to see him here. Overall, this is a very positive budget. It is no surprise that we were all a bit concerned and worried, as we would be, because we meet constituents all the time who are worried about their futures, their families, and about the cost of living. This budget very much aligns with Green Party policies and principles, which are about protecting the most vulnerable, progressive systems of taxation and social welfare, while also ensuring the future is a…

I welcome the Minister of State. I raise the issue because we are at the start of a school year. I raised the issue last year as well and said I was absolutely delighted that costs for school books in primary school have been taken away from parents. It should be the same across the entire school system. However, my major concern is that an industry developed around school books and the tab for that industry is now being picked up by the State. There is a cost element of school books but there is also a pollution e…

I thank the Minister of State. Her response highlighted the issue, which is that a system was put in place without a policy backing up what would happen for these individual schools. An overall system is needed. There is no skin off the nose of an individual school bringing on board a new school book but it is a cost for the State and for the environment. It is the job of the Government and the Department of Education, not an individual school, to ensure the system is in place. A directive is needed, rather than ju…

The Minister of State is very welcome today. I am delighted to have her in the Chamber, and I wanted to thank the caucus for putting care to the forefront of the activities of our parliamentarians. It is really important and as we have said many times in this Chamber, the Seanad being made up of 40% women, and having women at the table, makes a difference. That is the first thing I wanted to speak about. Before I was involved in politics, I started an organisation to advocate for stay-at-home parents. It was on tha…

I thank the Minister for attending and the Labour Party Senators for tabling the motion. Ireland is unusual when it comes to the type of care we have when compared with other European countries. We have a high number of family carers, which is unusual. A lot of countries have moved to institutional care, and we are the richer for not having done so. With that, however, comes a huge responsibility on the State. Based on everything I have heard and everything the Minister said, as well as judging by what we put into …

I raise last night's "RTÉ Investigates" programme. There is a group of people who are vilified, sidelined, silenced and at times ridiculed, namely, those advocating for animal welfare. What the programme showed is the resilience that this group has in pursuing better standards for the animals in our care. I thank Fran McNulty and "RTÉ Investigates" but it is also important to mention Caroline Rowley and all those across the animal welfare organisations, as well as my party's animal welfare group, for pursuing this …

I welcome Governor Healey. It is a mutually emotional moment any time we have somebody here with us to speak about their connection to our country. As the Governor outlined, it is the same in return. In September next, I will have members of my family, my own mini-diaspora, coming back to Ireland, from Australia, Canada and the US. This will give us an opportunity to visit places I have not been to before, some of my family's ancestral homes in Ireland. Sometimes we have to be reminded of our own family and own val…

I welcome the Minister of State and thank Senator Garvey for all her work on this issue. I second the motion. It was great to meet with the Institute of Guidance Counsellors this morning and with Jigsaw. One thing that stood out for me was the fact the nature of youth is changing and has changed. We were in a very different position a couple of decades ago. The Government has an obligation to move with that. One thing Jigsaw said to us this morning was that adolescence is happening earlier because of the complexity…

The Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, is very welcome back again in the Seanad. Social media has fuelled hatred but it has also put on display for all of us the dirty, filthy, underbelly of hatred in Irish society. That hatred has always existed. It may be fuelled by social media but what is the excuse when it comes to the way that Travellers have been treated across hundreds of years in this country? What is the excuse when it comes to the way people with disabilities have been treated in this country, especia…