Not in this contract.

The buck stops with the Minister.

Gabhaim buíochas leis an nGrúpa Reigiúnach agus le Cáit Nic Amhlaoibh mar gheall ar an obair atá déanta acu ar an rún seo. I thank the Regional Group and Cáit Nic Amhlaoibh for their work on the motion. Aontú supports the end of the means test for the carer's allowance. The reason we support it is that, no matter what background one is from or whether one is rich or poor, there is a sacrifice, hard work and opportunity lost in providing care for somebody else. It is really important to recognise that from the State…

I understand what the Minister is seeking to do with this Bill. We support the objective behind the Bill in this case. The law in this area has to be changed because current practice has been deemed unconstitutional. All minors should be treated equally under the law when considering their age. That is a really important issue. A couple of issues arise in the context of what is happening here. Some minors are involved in criminal activity and penalties relating to them do not arise until after they reach 18 years o…

Every day, more and more gardaí are resigning and retiring. Every day, gardaí are being attacked in this country. There is a breakdown in the criminal justice system which is leading to a situation where some criminals feel they can get away with murder with impunity if necessary. That is a very serious issue. I will repeat the core points on this issue. We certainly want to make sure children are not treated the same as adults in terms of grievous crimes. Children must be given opportunities to reform their ways a…

I wish to express my deepest sympathy to the family and friends of Aoife Johnston. Her death was a catastrophic disaster for her family and friends. Aoife was 16 years old when she died. Incredibly, she had to wait 12 hours in hospital before receiving treatment. Reading the report issued by Mr. Justice Clarke, it is incredible what happened in that situation. Aoife was triaged as a category 2 patient, meaning she should have been seen in ten minutes. However, due to the volume of patients in that location, it was …

The Minister, Deputy Donnelly, facilitated the closure of Loughlinstown ED as well. He bought into the lie that existed that the closure of EDs would somehow make people safer. It certainly has not, and the Government needs to apologise for the closure of the EDs.

There are five Deputies present, only three of whom are looking for re-election. The rest of the Deputies must be canvassing for the election at the moment.

I want to speak to the issue of care and the fact that care is so vital in our society at the moment. One in eight Irish people currently provide unpaid care. It is a tremendously tough job. It is often 24-7. It can be extremely demanding. How can we start to help, in the context of income, people who are providing care? Many of them are means-tested and many of them are suffering because they deliver care.

We accept that this is enormously valuable work.

That is really important to say. We also accept that the care that is actually provided saves the State a considerable amount of money. The Minister would have to recognise that the tens of thousands of men and women throughout the State who are caring are saving the State possibly billions of euro in terms of care that would otherwise have to be provided by the State. We know that individuals who provide care suffer significant income loss as a result of that. It is important to note that this year the Government …

I will be honest with the Minister - there is a crisis in care right across the State at the moment. If you look at childcare, for example, childcare units are closing on a weekly basis. Even though the people who provide childcare are professionals, they get some of the lowest wages in the State. Children in State care are in crisis at the moment. The State is putting children who are in State care into unregulated special emergency accommodation and many of those children are going missing and, according to studi…

We do have an issue with care in this country and we have to value care more than we do.

The question is, do we value care that is being delivered, sometimes by family members and oftentimes by non-family members, to people who are in need right across the country? The measure of the value a government places on a particular issue is through the financial contribution it will make to the delivery of that care. It is very clear that many people are suffering financially because of the delivery of that care. All I request is that there not be a financial penalty for those who deliver care.

The Minister will take up to Question No. 20.

Deputy Varadkar said that short of an asteroid hitting the planet, the national children's hospital would be built for €700 million by 2020. Here we are, with €2.2 billion spent, and it is still not built. A total of €300 million has been spent on metro north and not a shovel has been put in the ground. Ventilators costing €22 million that did not work were bought by the Government during the Covid period. It is costing €50,000 a year just to store them. One hundred electric buses bought by Dublin Bus did not move …

I will give another couple of examples. The Minister for Justice promised there would be a policing review after the Dublin riots. It does not exist anymore. There are 4,000 empty local authority homes at the moment. It takes eight months for them to be returned to the market. It takes three weeks for a private rental home to be returned to the market. A planning application has not even gone in for the flood defences that were promised in Midleton in 2017. Some €20 million was spent on pointless referendums where …

Everything is grinding to a halt. The Minister has to admit that.

There is no staff in the planning-----

Staff the planning departments.