I pay tribute to Senator Higgins for drafting this motion. As Senator Gavan has said, she went out of her way to draft a motion that Senators on the other side of the House could support. This is not a matter of party political differences but a moral issue among a group of humans sitting in this Chamber in the middle of a pandemic. With Covid-19, the ultimate question is when we will end the pandemic. We have asked this of the Government when we have seen much legislation come through the House in recent months. A…

I thank the Minister for coming in today to directly hear about this. I understand that as Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, he is extremely busy dealing with the substantial increase in spending across all Departments. I think he can hear where people are coming from and see that we are passionate advocates on behalf of our secretarial assistants. I do not want to go over all the points that other Senators have made and spoken at length on. However, Senator Higgins importantly outlined why our secretaria…

I thought about it and wondered what if somebody was a victim of domestic violence and was working for a Senator, and his or her name was published stating that he or she was working for X Deputy or X Senator or whomever? People have this idea that they are public property and that they have ownership over them for such low salary and low wages. We all put ourselves on a ballot paper, be it a Seanad or Dáil ballot paper or whatever. We all put ourselves out there in the public and we are well paid and well remunera…

Like Senator O’Reilly, I would like to remind Senator Mullen we had a referendum and its outcome very clearly showed the women and people of Ireland wanted people to have access to safe, legal, local abortion in Ireland. I was disappointed that in the discussion at the Joint Committee on Health today the Minister indicated the policy of the Act would not be reviewed, only the operation of the Act. The operation of abortion rights is always contested worldwide. I certainly do not think the women of Ireland will be h…

The Labour Party supports this Bill and we welcome its intent and the various matters it addresses. As many Government Members have said, this Bill is 90 years in the making, particularly with regard to the pressing need to stop delaying the development of large-scale renewable energy capacity such as wind farms. It is also about protecting our biodiversity. Green Party Members have a motion tomorrow night relating to the Antarctic. I never thought I would end up having to read so much about the Antarctic but what …

I pay tribute to Senator O'Loughlin for taking the initiative on this issue as a panel discussion. It is appropriate that we are discussing this issue at this time of night because this is the time that an awful lot of full council meetings take place. On many occasions, I have held many babies in the council chamber and assisted their mothers with newborns outside. It always seemed crazy that newborns had to sit in a waiting room in a council chamber when they should have been wrapped up at home while their mother…

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. The Labour Party will support this legislation today, as we continue to support Government efforts to tackle the pandemic. However, the virus is already tearing through the country, tearing through schools and tearing through this building. It is difficult to get a PCR test. Proper ventilation still is not part of our response. It seems to me that mandatory hotel quarantine is focused on travellers so that the Government can pretend it is doing something, while not addr…

I will push it to a vote today.

I want it explicitly stated on the record by a Minister that travelling for an abortion is considered a time-sensitive imperative medical reason. No Minister has done so for 18 months. Last month, I asked the Minister in the House directly and he did not come back. Senator Gavan offered to give him time and he still refused to say or acknowledge it. He had to go to check it out. He never came back and last night the Government voted down the proposal. Women can not wait any longer for this clarification. They are t…

I move amendment No. 3: In page 16, between lines 7 and 8, to insert the following: “(fa) who, being ordinarily resident in the State, is returning to the State having travelled to another state for— (i) an unavoidable, imperative and time-sensitive medical reason, or (ii) a termination of pregnancy, and the reason is certified by a person who is a registered medical practitioner or a person holding an equivalent qualification outside the State,”. In the debate on the Safe Access to Termination of Pregnancy Service…

How dare Senator Clifford-Lee say that I am stoking up fear or using inflammatory language.

How dare Senator Clifford-Lee say I am using inflammatory language. This affected me. How dare she say that.

I did not use inflammatory language. I will read out what is in this Bill and how the amendment clarifies it. I will tell the Senator why I am asking for a specific change in language from "travels to the State for an unavoidable, imperative and time-sensitive medical reason". The previous language used in regulations was "who, being ordinarily resident in ... [this] State, is returning to the State having travelled to another state". I know that during the summer this was interpreted in a certain way, which did no…

I am pressing this amendment because, legally, if any bad faith actors were to do something, there would be a difference between travelling to the State as opposed to having returned to the State. I acknowledge that it is also possible to make that difference clear within regulations because the initial language comes from regulations. I would like to see that clarified. I am pushing the amendment because one of the issues around this is that bad faith actors put a chill effect on stuff. That is what I am concerned…

I want to raise the issue of the 40th anniversary of the emergence of another pandemic, which is the AIDS pandemic. Today is World AIDS Day and it is important that we mark the day in this Chamber, in particular the stigma that still surrounds HIV and AIDS. When HIV and AIDS first emerged in the late 1980s it was a pandemic that was laden with both moral and social judgment. I am somebody who grew up in the early 1990s in an area of Dublin that was very affected by HIV and AIDS and I believe that it is important to…

The Labour Party supports this motion. I raise with the Minister of State a specific issue related to an article in The Irish Times on Saturday about the sacking of an Irish woman from Belfast, Emma Reilly, who was working with the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. There was a dispute between her and the human rights commission. Essentially, she was a whistle-blower because she noticed that the UN was passing on information to China, specifically giving names of some dissidents in the Uighur region. Ms Reilly was …

I thank the Leader for outlining the Order of Business. Members will have to excuse me as I am recovering from a cold - not Covid - and my voice is not great today. I raise the issue of the loophole in the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2021 that allows landlords who have not previously increased rent to compound it over recent years. We are living in a time when the livelihoods of many people have been impacted by job losses, the stop-starting of hospitality and the Covid pandemic. Could the Leader…

I welcome the Minister to the House and thank her for taking this matter. I understand that at the moment, given the current Covid numbers, she is particularly busy with managing the opening of the education and school system and keeping it going. I pay tribute to her and teachers throughout the country, who have kept schools going. One of the most important issues relates to keeping children in school, and the impact of lost days is significant, not least for kids in my area and from disadvantaged backgrounds. I r…

I thank the Minister. I understand her comments. I did not frame the Commencement matter in a specific way because such matters are sometimes ruled out of order. I also did not expect it to be selected for that reason. I understand that I sprung the issue on the Minister. I will email her and the Department after this debate. We can continue the engagement because I do not expect a specific answer, given that I did not flag the issue in advance. I thank the Minister for her engagement.

I often say when I rise to speak after a Sinn Féin Senator that I have the same issue to raise. I will also raise the local employment service because the issue is affecting the whole country and there is a time-sensitivity to it. I understand that local employment services have received an extension to their current contracts until the new year, but after the new year they are unsure where they will be. The Department of Social Protection has said to them that salary costs are too high. It seems extraordinary to m…