For leisure.

I wish to remember and acknowledge the late Mark Ryan who with his brother, David, was instrumental in the establishment of the scoping inquiry. There are no words for what has happened here. What was going through my head when I was coming over here is that, in this country, we commemorated 100 years of the troubles that we had. We are looking at this from 1927 to 2013. When you look at that in context, I do not know where the words are going to come from. I welcome this commission, I really do. Is it a little too…

Any price gouging by any major supermarket holder should be transparent. All their profits should be shown. Some people look at the smaller outlets whose turnover is up but whose profits are down. It is some of the major ones we need to look at to see why this is. We also have to look at the part the Government has played in this. It introduced wage increases, which we welcomed, but where does it come back to? It is being added on to the people who are going in buying the food. When you look at the tax regime the G…

That is true.

What will the Government put in place after the recent bomb find in Limerick near Aughinish Alumina? This was near a Russian-owned business. Five bombs were found in Ireland - three in the South, two in the North. What will be done about looking at Russian-owned buildings and properties in this country to protect the Irish people in case somebody targets them, especially in Limerick, where this happened? People in Askeaton are frightened that something like this might happen again. What will the Government put in p…

From my first day here I have been telling people I have been in the construction industry all my life. I will give colleagues whatever experience I can. Infrastructure is the key and being on budget and on time. From the time Irish Water was set up, it has not brought in one project on budget or on time. If anything, it is over budget all the time. That is the problem. Let it be developer-led infrastructure. Let them build the infrastructure to the design of Irish Water, standards which are there to be seen. Let i…

I thank all the students who are here today and all their families who are encouraging them to go to college. Parents now have to choose. If they have two children to go to college, they may not be able to afford it. Inflation costs at the moment are putting a massive strain on family life for the students and for all families. The Government has not provided adequate accommodation for students to go to college. The colleges do not have the accommodation. They have to try to get accommodation as close as they can t…

Look at them in the eye. Why cannot you look at them in the eye?

This is the first time you stuck your head up since you came in.

Now for round two.

I am not against wind farms or biodigesters but I am for health guidelines being adhered to. It has been shown in the documentation I have here, released under access to information on the environment regulations, that in November 2021 and April 2022 the then Minister, former Deputy Eamon Ryan, and the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, agreed to abandon the 2017 preferred draft approach to wind energy guidelines, a plan based on science and environmental law and a format approved by Government. Instead of following…

I thank the Tánaiste for his reply. We have had guidelines since 2006. The Tánaiste is right; it has taken 12 years where we are looking at guidelines. Every time there is a change of Government, it is guidelines, guidelines, guidelines. If there are guidelines put in place for wind turbines in this country, at least they can be put up straight away. You will not have High Court battles or objections because the guidelines will be there. It is the same for biodigesters. It is the exact same thing. If guidelines are…

I thank the speakers who spoke in support of this motion. However, I saw the reply from the Minister and the 28 proposals amending what we proposed. They are a copy and paste. That does not give me any encouragement that the Minister is listening. What does Independent Ireland have that the Government and Department do not have? We have common sense. The Taoiseach, Deputy Micheál Martin, said on the floor of the House last week that the majority of common sense is coming from this corner. Why is that? Why do we kno…

Garda Tom Flavin was suspended from An Garda Síochána in 2018. He has been cleared of all 22 charges. It took the legal system seven years for a Garda investigation. He has now been reinstated. He had his sergeant exam done before he was suspended. Seven years were lost to a Garda investigation and others are ongoing. How long does it take for the Garda to investigate itself? We did without eight gardaí in Limerick because it took so long. Can this be sped up? When justice gets it wrong, it should have to reinstate…

The report by "RTÉ Investigates" makes me sick to my stomach that this could happen. I look at the nursing homes around Limerick and other nursing homes I have visited. Through social events that we do, such as vintage events, we recreate lives of people who are in the nursing homes. We bring in some of the older stuff to them and see what the nursing homes do. I have been at a lot of nursing homes and we have done this. None of the bigger nursing homes, those with 100 beds or that, do this. The community nursing h…

I am a believer. I grew up believing there are Thirty-two Counties in Ireland, not Twenty-Six Counties. We are the island of Ireland. Call me old school; that is the way I was brought up. People from the North of Ireland can run for President but would not be able to vote for themselves. They are from Ireland. It is the island of Ireland. That is the bottom line. How many people who have left these shores and gone to Australia, Dubai and all the other countries are not citizens of the other countries? They hold an …

In Limerick, Local Link is operating at capacity. To improve the system, people are looking for more services. Local Link would not be in our area were it not for private operators. We would not have it otherwise. I appreciate the investment the Department is putting into Local Link, but there is no joined up thinking. It is doing one route. It should be doing a figure 8 on all links such that when one route is done it links up with one spot where the other route connects to it in order that an operator can go from…

For people who do not understand it, RPZs are rent pressure zones. Where do we go? How did we get here in the first place? We got here because of a lack of infrastructure. What have we done over the past six years? I have been asking our Government to look at development-led infrastructure but what we did was that we set up Irish Water. Irish Water was set up to collect money for existing water products. It was set up to put in meters to collect money from people for the usage of water. It is now a runaway train. T…

I am the chairperson of the Committee on Budgetary Oversight, and I am delighted to be Independent Ireland's first chairperson. An invitation to the Minister to attend our meeting next Tuesday was sent by the clerk to the committee. We had facilitated the Minister, in that he could not make it two weeks ago. We changed people around and other people appeared before us. However, we got a note back saying the Minister's officials were not available on that date. I do not accept that. With all due respect to the offic…

We will be sharing time. We will each have three and a half minutes. There is a housing crisis. We need to deliver houses. I am offering my services to the Minister, as I have offered them to other Ministers, to help to deliver houses. I do so in light of the experience I have and the knowledge I have that Irish Water is not providing value for money. It will not deliver the infrastructure needed to deliver houses. That is a fact. With all the millions and billions it is quoting the Government to deliver infrastruc…