Many people in my constituency in Limerick are waiting up to nine months for a driving test. I listened to the Minister of State read out his piece of paperwork. He said that under the Road Safety Authority Act 2006 "the RSA has statutory responsibility for the national driver testing service as well as the national car testing service". Does he agree that the RSA and the Government have a legal obligation and responsibility to provide for the safe passage of people, whether they are pedestrians, cyclists, motorist…

Businesses are struggling to get workers. What is the status on the times it is taking to issue permits given employers are experiencing labour shortages which are having financial impacts on businesses?

I thank the Minister for his reply, but as much as I take what he read into account, it is not factual. Permits are coming through our offices at the moment and we are dealing with people. We are in the third month of dealing with some of them. They have been delayed. We contact the offices and they say they are being processed. The Minister said it was 18 days, or 16 days for critical cases. Sections of the hospitality sector have critical employment they need to fill, as do the agri sector and transport. They tel…

The Minister got it right. From what he just said, he is now looking at a commonsense approach. In other words, the visa is through the Department of Justice and his Department. If they can work together, rather than working in two separate Departments, and do applications together, it would speed up the process of getting people in who need a visa for their permits. That seems to be the major problem. When it comes to visas and permits, it goes to one route, then the other and it takes too long. It would be nice i…

I also share in the sympathy for Kim Damti's family. For a young woman of 22 years of age to lose her life in such a tragic way is horrific. I ask the Tánaiste about one of his Ministers ignoring Transport Infrastructure Ireland's, TII, data on spending funds on restructuring roads and maintenance of existing roads. The Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, decided against it even though his Department has full data that show the number of fatalities that will be caused if funds are not spent on the national road networks. …

And our roadsides?

I am asking about the roads.

Again, the Tánaiste did not listen to the question. I was on about roadside hedges. I am all for biodiversity. All the other hedges that are inside can grow. I am talking about roadsides and the protection of people who travel on them. It has emerged that the Minister for Transport, Deputy Eamon Ryan, was warned last year that the failure to properly invest in new road projects and improvements on roads would result in 77 deaths and 381 serious injuries over the next five years. There was a shocking €88 million red…

But the funding-----

I thank the service providers and representatives for coming here today. I will speak about what section 39 workers in County Limerick mean to me. The father of the Minister of State, Deputy O'Donnell, was a founding member of St. Joseph's Foundation in Charleville. We are very fortunate to have access to the St. Joseph's Foundation in Granagh, where I am from. It has been there for many years. It now also has an equestrian therapy centre. On 1 October, singer-songwriter Brian Kennedy will come to St. Joseph's, as …

I will start with the increase in the minimum wage. Before I do, I point out that I am an employer so I understand where this comes from, I understand what it means for employees to get more money and I have no problem with this. However, employees need to know about the increase they are getting. Based on a 40-hour week, a person on €11.30 would gross €452 and would have a net wage of €405.92, and the employee pays €46.08 in tax and the employer pays €49.95. That is a total of €96.03 in taxes between the employee …

I am going to start by referencing the Law Reform Commission consultation report for a Bill that was never enacted. According to the abstract of the 2005 report: The Report deals with the liability of corporations for the death of human persons arising from gross negligence. The Report recommends that an offence of 'corporate manslaughter' should be introduced, to be prosecuted on indictment only, where gross negligence involving a significant risk of death or serious personal harm causes death.... The offence woul…

That is gross negligence on his behalf. People have died on the roads because funding has not been put into infrastructure. People have died on the roads because the local authorities do not have money to fill potholes on the basic roads. People have died on the roads because of rules that hedges cannot be cut at certain times of the year. Every road in Ireland - I said road only - should have 1 m in and straight up of hedge cutting allowed. It protects pedestrians, it protects cyclists and it protects the buses go…

The first time the Minister, Deputy Ryan, spoke during Covid-19, I said I had no confidence in that person. He stood up in this House at a time of crisis and stated we should paint the back of our houses and grow lettuce on our south-facing windows so at least we would have our greens. This country could do without the Green Party because it penalising everyone by not having infrastructure in place. Common sense is not that common when it comes to the Green Party. It will enforce taxes on everyone and will not put …

I ask the Minister to take some small advice from someone with common sense. He should eat some lettuce and he might actually come up with some of the ideas that we have because we do grow our own greens in our area. We do as much as we can to help the environment in our areas. The Minister is doing nothing to help the people of this country who he is supposed to protect.

The Minister should call his committee.

The Minister should call his own committee.

I am a reformed smoker. I gave up cigarettes in 1996 and I am glad I did it but, at the same time, I cannot support an increase in the price of cigarettes because it is a personal choice for people themselves to give up. The Minister quoted statistics suggesting the incidence of smoking had dropped in recent years from 29% to 14% and that is probably correct, but I do not think that takes into account the consumption of illegal cigarettes coming into this country or the number of people who have switched to alterna…

If we are honest here and 98.7% of the House had no confidence in the Minister, she would not be here. If 51% had no confidence, she would not be here. However, 98.7% of the members of An Garda Síochána have no confidence in Commissioner Harris and he is still here. He has single-handedly destroyed the Garda service in Ireland. Gardaí are no longer counting the years to retirement; they are counting the days and hours. Those who want to join the force are saying if the Commissioner does not listen to gardaí, what h…

The Government has done the same thing to early childcare providers that it did to elder care providers in this country. It helped to close down providers of elder care in the form of small nursing homes and now it is doing the same in respect of early care of children. Childcare providers are under pressure because of inflation and that is happening as a result of all the decisions made by the Government, which have made it impossible to provide a service. The impact of the inflation the Government has caused on p…