I will continue the earlier discussion. The welfare of workers is an economic question and an economic imperative. I refer to the Taoiseach's response on Debenhams and the possibility of another such situation unfolding with the Arcadia workers who, I believe, will be protesting outside Leinster House early next week. Unless Arcadia is bought out, it is also facing liquidation and the possibility that the two-plus-two contractual agreement the workers had with the Arcadia group will disappear and they will be looki…

Unfair environmental trade.

As has been said, it is going to be many months before we can get the population vaccinated. Until then, and perhaps beyond, the front line against Covid-19 remains in our hospitals. I want to respond to the systematic misrepresentations on the Taoiseach's part of the issue concerning student nurses and midwives, arising from a motion which we tabled several weeks ago. Let us be clear what is at stake and try to address directly what the student nurses and midwives are asking for. During the Covid-19 pandemic, they…

The Taoiseach used the word "balance".

What of the student nurses?

It has been pretty much happening for years.

Last week the Government voted down the motion where we called on it to acknowledge that hundreds of student nurses and midwives were working and are being exploited and to pay them. The Tánaiste should not try to obfuscate. In doing that, the Government betrayed the programme for Government commitment, specifically to return the support of healthcare workers who protected us all. The Government then made the decision to take away the healthcare assistant rate that it had been forced to give them in the early perio…

The Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, did.

The Government does not respect the democracy of this House.

Last Wednesday, the Taoiseach and his Government insulted the student nurses and midwives of this country by voting down the Solidarity-People Before Profit motion, which was drawn up in conjunction with those student nurses and midwives, calling for them to be paid. The Taoiseach has since insulted them by suggesting that they are not doing real work and that he is protecting their education, when we have repeatedly given him dozens of testimonies from those student nurses and midwives about the extent of their wo…

I am sorry, I have to respond.

One student said: "My name is Conor. I am a first-year nursing student. In the last week I have had to wash, feed, lift and dress Covid-positive patients unsupervised." Another, Michelle, said: I finished my final six weeks' unpaid placement of fourth year. I was doing between 70 to 80 hours per week for six weeks, sometimes finishing placement at 8.00 p.m. and going directly into a 12-hour night duty sleepover shift, most of the time not sleeping as I had to get up and assist people with their needs. I could go on…

Nonsense. Absolute nonsense.

It is the Government's health service.

We do not think it is okay.

I have invited the Taoiseach to meet the people involved.

Does the Taoiseach want to meet them?

Are any of these press advisers the people who researched a speech of mine from back in 2016 to inform the Taoiseach's earlier attempts at deflection over the student nurses and midwives? Would their time not have been better spent overnight, instead of looking at a speech of mine about FEMPI in 2016, looking at the hundreds of testimonies from student nurses and midwives about their systematic work exploitation with the sick, with those with Covid and with those giving birth? Would those advisers not have been bet…

The Taoiseach has not checked out the situation of the student nurses.

So they can be victimised?