When will the investigation be completed?

We have a record-breaking Government but for all the wrong reasons. We have record housing prices. Some 15 years after Fianna Fáil generated the last property bubble, we have the same Celtic tiger house prices. The price of a three-bedroom home is increasing by €100 every day in this State. We have record rents. Rents are more than €254 per month higher than they were during the Celtic tiger era. People in their twenties and thirties are paying a record share of their income on accommodation. In real terms, their s…

I welcome the work of the Raise the Roof campaign and I was delighted to attend its launch in Meath not so long ago. From Phil Hogan, to Deputies Kelly and Coveney, Eoghan Murphy and now the Minister, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, we have been told that there is no overnight fix to the housing crisis we are in. However, it is now more than a decade since we first heard that excuse being used in the Chamber. I have three constituency offices. We are inundated with housing issues. Like many Members in this Chamber, I have …

The cost of living is squeezing families throughout the country. There is a feeling of the 1980s in towns and villages the length and breadth of the country at the moment. Families simply cannot pay bills. They cannot buy the necessities such as food and clothing for their children. Food banks and Society of St. Vincent de Paul groups throughout the country are out the door at the moment. The Capuchin Day Centre in Dublin and other food-support networks are inundated. There is a real crisis washing through the whol…

The Minister will agree that the position of Irish ambassador to Britain is very important, especially at this time of crisis in our relationship with Britain. I was surprised to hear of the Minister's decision to appoint the Secretary General of the Department of the Taoiseach, Martin Fraser, to the position of Irish ambassador to Britain. As Deputies know, there is an investigation into the leaking of a confidential document by the Tánaiste, Deputy Varadkar, to his friend - the head of a rival general practitione…

There is a case before the DPP.

I used the word "if".

Beidh mé cúramach. I just want to clarify what I said. The Garda has sent the Tánaiste's file to the DPP, and there may be a case. That is clear and factual. My concern about this is that I have submitted a great many questions to the Minister in regard to the appointment. My worry about the appointment is that it may be the case that the individual may need to give evidence in the future. This appointment has echoes similar to the Katherine Zappone affair. Many questions have been left unanswered. I asked if the C…

To make it clear, I am not looking to damage anybody's reputation.

I submitted these questions to the Minister in written format first and they were not answered. I have a responsibility as an Opposition Deputy to look for oversight in respect of appointments of this nature. One of the questions I asked that was not answered - and that has still not been answered today - is: when did the Cabinet become aware of that decision and when did the Minister become aware of it? I also asked questions about who was interviewed for the position, the dates on which the interviews took place …

Rachel Barry was brutally abused as a child while she was in foster care in County Galway. She disclosed her abuse and that of another child in 2007, but despite this, other children were left in the same foster home for years. The children were eventually removed from the home when the other child confirmed the abuse. This was an incredible failing on behalf of the State. I asked Tusla how many times it reported suspected child abuse to the Garda over the past decade. It told me it has no statistics in relation to…

In its first ever inspection of hospital overcrowding, the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, found that there was a risk of a grossly overcrowded emergency department in University Hospital Limerick. It found that one of the patients was waiting on a trolley for five days and that people were travelling from the mid-west to Dublin to access accident and emergency departments. Emergency departments have record levels of waiting times, with most people waiting for roughly 13 hours. Older people are wait…

They would agree.

Make no mistake, Minister, this disaster is an indictment of the Government and not a reflection on the health professionals who carry the weight and burden of Government mismanagement on their shoulders. That is the truth and do not try to deflect it. The Government entered into pay talks with low- and middle-income earners in the public service and the Minister, Deputy Michael McGrath, is offering them a 2.5% increase in salary. He is telling low-income individuals they will have a pay increase, potentially, of a…

There were 20,000 beds. There are 14,000 now.

It is 2.5% for low incomes.

We would link pay to productivity for senior public servants.

I move amendment No. 1 to amendment No. 1: To delete all words from "notes that" down to and including "could be considered" and substitute the following: "calls for: — the Government to end plans to close the ED in Our Lady's Hospital, Navan; — the Government to remove the policy within Securing the Future of Smaller Hospitals: A Framework for Development to downgrade Our Lady's Hospital, Navan from a level 3 hospital to a level 2 hospital; and — the necessary investment to be made by the HSE to restore acute surg…

When?

How did it take ten years to ask that question?