I am very supportive of the R and D tax credit. A previous question was asked about our competitiveness. Innovation at all levels of business is very important. I am glad the Minister said it would take €100 million to bring it to €80,000 for services. The Minister may already have this information. If he does, I might ask him another question to try to get information on the position if we were to bring it to, say, €50,000, €60,000 or €70,000. It is worth examining this with regard to how we might change it. We ha…

In parallel to this, it is very important to look at derelict sites that are owned by local authorities. The Tánaiste says this is a big job of work for them, and it absolutely is, but it is critical that we cannot be taxing someone on one side of the street when the local authority has a huge derelict site on the other side of the street and is doing nothing about it. I do not necessarily blame the local authorities. They need to work with the centre. I respect that the Tánaiste is not the Minister for housing, bu…

There can be no watering-down of the commitments made in the British and Irish Governments' joined legacy framework. There are parts of that framework I question but it is very important. I welcome the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee report on this legacy legislation. The primary legislation underpinning the political framework is moving through Westminster. The bottom line is that the legislation must command the confidence of the families and be human rights compliant in order for it to properly deal with the …

I will talk about the regulation of quarries. The Taoiseach knows the price we have paid in this country and the price that families affected by the defective concrete blocks scandal have paid due to a lack of regulation. Many of the homeowners I have spoken to in Mayo are not satisfied with the current regulations of quarries and in particular, that geologists are not examining the aggregate within the quarries that are being used to build homes now. I ask the Taoiseach to have a look at this area to see what can …

I cannot believe I am reading this legislation. I have waited every week for it since March. It could have been done in April, May, June, July, August, September, October or November. Here we are now in December and this is what the Government gives us? Is the Government going to take all the calls from people in County Mayo tonight when they look at this legislation and see that 29 March is an arbitrary cut-off date? The Government cannot do this. We will obviously be putting in amendments to this legislation. Min…

I do not know who thought it was acceptable, or who thought it was acceptable for the Minister to go back on his word. It is certainly not acceptable to me or to homeowners in Mayo. I also wish to raise retrospective payments. Time and time again, I have asked him to cover houses that people had to build before the scheme in. They have to be covered. There are gaps that people are trying to deal with. Let us take Páirc na Coille in Westport. There is €50,000 of a gap. How in the name of God does the Minister expect…

I am not confident in what is coming out and that the inspection regimes are good enough. The people in Mayo, because they have been let down time and time again, do not have confidence in that either. The Minister referred to alternative suitable accommodation. Deputy Pearse Doherty presented the Minister with a solution to it last week. Again, it was refused by the new the all-singing, all-dancing Minister for Finance. Again, when a solution was presented to him, the Minister for housing turned his back. There ne…

The Minister of State has to take out the date of 29 March; I am begging him.

I congratulate the Minister of State on his new role. When we talk about rescue services, I wish to remember Dara Fitzpatrick, Mark Duffy, Paul Ormsby and Ciarán Smith from Rescue 116 who lost their lives on duty in 2017. I also wish to remember Caitríona Lucas from 2016 and the many others who have lost their lives in their service to this country. I thank my colleagues Deputies Cullinane and McGuinness for putting the motion forward. We should not even have to do this. It is disgraceful. It is an insult to the Co…

I thank the Independent Technical Group for tabling this motion. It is very important. I thank those in the Gallery who have paid the price, their families and those who are not with us today. Deputy Buckley rightly remembers those who are no longer here. We are here today to confront a profound failure of law, protection and leadership. It is a failure that punishes the brave and protects the powerful. It is a failure that tells every ordinary person in the State not to speak up or they will pay the price. I want …

I have seven and a half minutes. Evidence can be shaped. Witnesses can be influenced. Records can be altered or destroyed. Justice can be quietly denied. This is not a minor flaw; it is systemic failure. The Government knows about this gap, but continues to send a clear and chilling message, that if people speak up about criminal activity in An Garda Síochána, they cannot be guaranteed that the wrongdoing will be exposed. If people show courage, the system may very well punish them for it. This is the reality. This…

At last week's session of the Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement, we had a profound contribution from the All-Island Cancer Research Institute and the All-Island Congenital Heart Disease Network. It highlighted once again what we have known for some time, namely, that lives can be saved and healthcare can only be delivered to an optimum level across the island when we have an all-island approach to healthcare for the 7 million people living on the island. It makes zero sense on a small isl…

That is not true.

Yes, but it is not the truth.

Do not tell untruths.

You are the Taoiseach.

You are the leader.

We have done several studies.

I ask the Tánaiste to think about this amendment because we in Sinn Féin are trying to find practical solutions. I have been trying to find practical solutions to this situation with pyrite and defective concrete blocks for over a decade. We keep presenting solutions to Government that are not accepted, so I ask the Tánaiste to look at this amendment. It makes sense. It is time-limited. There are homeowners who are in a position to rebuild their homes but they do not have alternative accommodation. This is particul…

To continue on that, the Tánaiste really needs to get that this is not just business as usual but a humanitarian situation. The bottom line for me in Mayo, right from the beginning when I first saw people's houses collapsing, was that nobody would be left behind or locked out of this scheme because they could not afford to get into it, could not find an alternative property or whatever else might lock them out. We cannot leave people behind in this situation because it was not their fault. It was not their fault th…