It is about equality.

I welcome the Commissioner to the House. We are delighted to have her here today. We do not often get to discuss European affairs and, therefore, this is a really important day for us. I was also delighted she spent so much of her time discussing climate, biodiversity and the emergency and how we are looking back over the past few decades and saying we got it wrong. Europe and Ireland got it wrong in pushing for a particular form of agriculture that actually has done our farmers a disservice when we look at what is…

The Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is very welcome. First, I put on record my thanks to Senator O'Loughlin and the full team for their work in putting together this report. Human beings have a tendency during times of relative peace to forget that our democracy is constantly under threat but now, across Europe, we cannot forget that. It is very much in our face. That is why it is really important to have the summit at this time. The Council of Europe continues to do its work, regardless. Having this rights-…

The Minister of State, Deputy Malcolm Noonan, is welcome to the Chamber. I thank Senator Garvey for all her work and I also thank Councillor Kate Ruddock for her passion on this topic. When we were kids, there was no such thing as plastic bottles of water. I will not say how much later it is but a little time later and we are surrounded by plastic waste. It is actually one of the real tangible things when it comes to the environment that people see and they can recognise as "This is a change I can make", but we mus…

I really appreciate the opportunity to speak to the Minister today. I am from the west of Ireland. I absolutely recognise the challenges that are there for sheep farmers. It is very important to note that prices have increased since the Minister was requested by this Chamber to be here. That is very welcome. I will speak first about the findings of the wool feasibility study. It is not true to say the Government is not doing anything. It is responding to the wool feasibility study, for a start, and I know that the …

I rise in utter frustration and, indeed, with determination when it comes to even the smallest of green actions. Virtually all the parties across the board yet again voted against a cycle lane in Galway last night, this time on the east side of the city. This was a proposal put forward by the council itself. People will recall the famous Salthill cycle lane that was voted against, but this time, not only did Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael vote against the cycle lane but so also did the Labour Party, the Social Democrats…

I really wish I was not in the Chamber this morning raising this issue. It is a bit ridiculous at this stage. I have stood on the picket lines with schools secretaries. They are the beating heart of schools. They found it really difficult to leave their workplace and go out on the picket lines. They were delighted that they reached a pay deal with the support of Fórsa and yet here we are, a year later, and they still have not seen a penny. I spoke to a school secretary this morning who said the secretaries were wat…

There is nothing new in this response. I still have no clarity on what will happen to the school secretaries this summer. That is really their main concern at this point. In addition, I do not want to get started on circulars and the way the Department deals with schools. The Minister of State is saying a small number of schools have not responded. It may be voluntary for school secretaries to take up this pay deal, but surely to God it cannot be voluntary for schools to send out a survey to find out what their sch…

I thank the Minister of State for joining us today. I also thank his officials for providing a briefing for Senators on Monday. However, I have to say I was the only Senator who turned up to that briefing. I also want to thank the officials for briefing us last week at the Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action. Perhaps the Senators who are in the Chamber today availed of last week's briefing and had the information they required, and so did not need a further briefing this week. Having listened to the M…

Now.

I am going to speak about Rare Disease Day, which was mentioned by a previous speaker, because it is important to do so. Even though 300,000 people in Ireland are obliged to deal with rare diseases, it is very difficult for individuals to advocate for any kind of intervention on their behalf. An alliance of the organisations involved is important. I am involved with Addison's Ireland. Very few people - the estimate is one in 100,000 - have Addison's disease. I am one of them. I would like to give a shoutout today t…

I warmly welcome the latest round of cost-of-living supports announced by the Government today, particularly its focus on supporting those most in need. It was absolutely correct that the measures which the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, had proposed around universal measures to apply over the winter proceeded and, indeed, a third round of €200 supports for everyone is to come in March and April. When looking at State funding, we need to prioritise winter over summer because it is in winter that people really need th…

I will be very brief. I congratulate my colleague, Senator Martin, on pursuing this and I give very significant thanks to Noeline Blackwell for all her work, not only on legislation but also in advocacy down through the years. It is quite interesting that so much legislation on violence against women, in particular - it is predominantly women who are impacted by this legislation - has come through the Seanad in our term. We are almost seeing a snowball effect now. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, so mu…

I welcome the Minister. I came back from Brussels this morning. I was there yesterday to help launch an atlas on contraception for Europe. Ireland has jumped significantly, by 15%, to make it into the top four. This has happened quickly because of small measures but, in some ways, it has taken quite a while to get here because the likes of the Irish Family Planning Association has been advocating for this for some time. It does go to show what a Government can do when it puts its mind to making lives better. I mean…

The Minister of State is very welcome to the Chamber. This is a very technical Bill. All of us listening to the Minister of State's very detailed speech would be forgiven for not fully getting to grips with the details of it. I appreciate that he is coming back with an amendment on Committee Stage. All of this is underpinned by the fact that over the past two years the price of electricity and all types of fuel has shot up because of the Russian war and the invasion of Ukraine. In addition, we have not invested in …

At 2.30 p.m. next Tuesday.

I thank the Cathaoirleach. I thank the Minister of State for coming to the Chamber today. As the Cathaoirleach has said, a number of Members have raised this issue, and Senator Buttimer has indeed been at the forefront on the issues around cystic fibrosis. I am here for an update from the Minister of State. He will be aware that Cystic Fibrosis Ireland had called for a health technology assessment to be completed by the end of January. We are now into February. I submitted this Commencement matter at the end of Jan…

I will not get into a long discussion on the stranglehold that pharma companies have when it comes to providing treatment. As the Minister of State indicated, a huge amount of money was given to Vertex. I am disappointed that we have no update on the HTA. I ask the Minister of State to go back to the Minister and ask him to, as soon as possible, give me a date by which he thinks it will be completed. Cystic Fibrosis Ireland wanted this done by the end of January. We have a new group in Leinster House of Senators an…

The Minister is very welcome and I am delighted to be here today as someone who has worked as a family law solicitor myself. I feel very passionately about this piece of legislation and, indeed, I had the very great honour of being in the negotiations, along with the Minister, Deputy O’Gorman, for the Green Party, with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. It was a priority for us to put this into the programme for Government and this is a very significant day. It is completely true to say that family law cases are very traum…

The Cathaoirleach is very welcome to the Chair. It is lovely to see him sitting there. I congratulate Senator Chambers who I am sure will do a fantastic job as she did as Deputy Leader. I very much enjoyed working with her and I know that I will continue to work well with her. I also wanted to welcome BQMS O'Brien and Ms Kettle. I thank them for coming in. It is very important that we have that meeting between the legislators and people who are impacted by the work that goes on here. It is very important. I wanted …