Do the right thing and annul it.

That is scandalous. The Taoiseach has made a serious statement. If true, it would amount to illegality. He is doing so because he cannot defend the situation where, on the one hand, he is cutting payments for PUP recipients who are travelling abroad while, at the same time, standing over and defending the payments to himself and the super junior Ministers.

He made an allegation about the funding of my constituency office.

I am asking the Ceann Comhairle to protect me in this Chamber, as a Member of this House representing the people of Donegal. The Taoiseach has made a serious allegation in regard to the funding of my constituency office, suggesting it is funded through illegal sources---

He did say it. He said it was funded from America. It would be illegal in this jurisdiction to fund the operation in that way.

That is a scurrilous allegation.

The Taoiseach is making a scurrilous statement because he cannot stand up and defend the indefensible. He and his colleagues in government just voted to stop payments to people in receipt of the PUP who travel outside the country.

This is a significant issue of concern as the Taoiseach is hearing now from Deputies. In the past 24 hours I have spoken to two private coach operator providers in my own county of Donegal. There is great anxiety there because they were hoping that there would be some type of rescue plan for them in the July stimulus package. It has not materialised. These are the same companies that have been hit hard as a result of the mortgage payment breaks because they are being penalised with interest being accrued during tha…

I am not sure which motion the Minister has read because the Sinn Féin motion does not call for a roadmap. It calls for the reduction of class sizes in line with the European average of 20:1, which she failed to address. She did not use any of her ten minutes to acknowledge that, at primary level, we have the highest class sizes in Europe. Nor did she acknowledge the fact that one in five of our children is in classes of more than 30 pupils and this makes the challenge of returning to school in a safe way all the m…

Ar dtús báire, déanaim comhghairdeas leis an Leas-Cheann Comhairle agus í i mbun a céad dualgais sa phost. Is lá iontach é dár dtír agus don Dáil seo ós rud é go bhfuil an chéad bhean, agus Gaeilgeoir líofa, tofa mar Leas-Cheann Comhairle na Dála seo. On 15 July, the European General Court ruled that the competition commission did not succeed in showing the requisite legal standard that Apple Sales Ireland, ASI, and Apple Operations Europe, AOE, had been granted illegal state aid through selective tax advantages. I…

Sinn Féin Deputies are opposing this section. We have tabled an amendment. This section is silent and has not been referred to by any of the Ministers even though the Bill is only three sections long. What is happening is absolutely crazy. The Government has deemed it a priority to rush through an amendment to this legislation, legislation that Sinn Féin would otherwise be supporting and welcoming as has been pointed out by our spokesperson, Deputy Conway Walsh. Section 2 gives junior Ministers who are already on a…

I am not going to take time to respond to the Minister bar to say that he should be better briefed, especially in his Department. He would know that all five parties in Northern Ireland opposed the increases of £1,000 to MLAs and asked for it to be deferred. No Minister or party of any political view passed legislation to increase salaries in the North. What they, including Michelle O'Neill MLA , actually did was to call it scandalous and outrageous and to say that it should not happen in the middle of a pandemic.

What the Minister is saying is that his Ministers of State, on salaries of €124,000, need an extra €16,000 and he is asking us to change the law of this State to allow that to happen. Perhaps we can have a wee whip-around if we get Deputy Michael Healy-Rae’s cap to help out the poor Ministers of State who cannot survive on €124,000. That is the reality of this. The Minister is asking this House to change the law so that legislatively the Government can increase the salary for a Minister of State because he or she h…

Tá na scoileanna druidte ó 13 Márta agus tá tuismitheoirí, páistí agus múinteoirí fágtha sa dorchadas ó thaobh na bpleananna don todhchaí agus do Mheán Fómhair. Cuireadh moill ar fhoilsiú na bpleananna seo arís agus arís. Rinne an t-iar-Rialtas agus an t-iar-Aire praiseach dóibh agus anois nílimid ag feiceáil nó ag cloisteáil aon rud ón Aire úr. Schools have been closed since 13 March. Parents, teachers and students have been left in the dark ever since. We have had delay after delay. The previous Government made a…

The Tánaiste said that is the plan but none of us have seen the plan. He has asked the people to bear with us for a couple of days or a couple of weeks. The reality is that the people have borne with the Tánaiste for the past four months since the schools closed. It is now just over four weeks until the schools are due to open. We need a bit of certainty. We appreciate that some of this might take a bit longer. We need to know, for example, if the plan is for all children, nearly 1 million of them, to return to edu…

On Tuesday, I was glad to see that the Tánaiste agreed with my view when a spokesperson said on his behalf that, if the travel advice for countries on the green list was not different to the advice relating to other countries, we would be better off not having a green list at all. Fair play to the Tánaiste. On Tuesday night, however, the Government agreed the opposite. It gave a green light to go and then said "Do not go". The advice from the Government remains not to travel except in essential circumstances. Last …

We are, in effect, in committee when debating the Revised Estimates and, as such, I expect a back-and-forth engagement with the Ministers of State during the five minutes available to me. I want to make the point again and send a clear signal to the Government that the way some of the business in this House is conducted is not acceptable and is showing disregard to the Dáil and to Members. The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform should be here for this discussion. It is standard practice that it is the Minis…

With respect, I have five minutes to make my points. I asked the Minister of State a direct question: did a memorandum go to Cabinet last night----

-----to increase the wages of a junior Minister who is already on €124,000 by €16,288?

The Acting Chair is obliged to protect Deputies. I asked the Minister of State a direct question but he is speaking about something else-----