I expected this to be one of the questions on which there would be agreement. I am referring to people who fell between stools and who could not avail of supports others were able to avail of. We all know the issues concerning farm demographics. Farmers will talk about the difficulty and the fact that so many of them are particularly old. In an awful lot of cases, their own kids do not want to undertake farming. It is absolutely right to give the necessary support to those who made the steps and did everything corr…

I welcome that. I am not going to go through this again. Obviously, we want to see the necessary supports sooner and faster and we want them to be better. Could the Minister give any indication about a general timeline, accepting the difficulties he said arise? The affected people have been waiting for an answer and for supports for a considerable amount of time.

I would consider that to be very fair and constructive.

The eviction ban has been lifted. I do not believe a sufficient number of solutions or services are in play. I have talked to Louth County Council homeless services; they have reinforced this in my head. My question relates to the tenant in situ scheme. Louth County Council is at this point processing a number above the actual target it has. My fear is that it will not have the resources if more come into play and it will not be able to deal with this quickly enough. I know resources have been put into the Departme…

Here we go.

Organised and disorganised crime have flourished in areas of high disadvantage, areas that nobody cared about for many years, under multiple governments of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Deputy O'Dowd spoke about the Drogheda implementation board and its plan. I am very much in support of that type of multi-agency response. There are still issues. The Red Door Project and others may be glad of certain bits of funding, but nobody has the real multi-annual funding required to be strategic. Let us be clear: we are talking…

I will follow up on that. It is a fair point. Is it possible to have that conversation at an EU Council level? If it is not possible to have that conversation even among some of the states across the European Union, Ireland will have to do an element of heavy lifting in relation to supporting the Palestinians. That will mean progressing the occupied territories Bill, recognising the state of Palestine and dealing with the issue as regards the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund. Allowing the fund to be a shareholder …

I concur with an awful lot of what has been said. We will all be supportive of this. We are all aware of backlogged court systems. It is a trite statement on some level to say justice delayed is justice denied but it is very true. I remember doing jury duty and dealing with an assault case. I will not go into the ins and outs of it but the fact is that we were dealing with something that had happened four years previously. I do not see that anybody is served by this type of delay and we are all aware of it. In fair…

We all have huge differences with American foreign policy but it is fair to say President Joe Biden is somebody who has a real connection with Ireland and with north County Louth and the Cooley Peninsula, which is obviously a fabulous part of the world. It was news to us all the vital part Rob Kearney played in the independence struggle so I thank President Biden for that. Let us be clear: American support has been absolutely vital in respect of the Good Friday Agreement, the protocol and the Windsor Framework. I w…

Yes, and possibly the Cooley Peninsula. There has been considerable conversation about being 25 years into the Good Friday Agreement. There were many twists and turns before and after that period but it is the lynchpin of what has been a very successful peace process. In the world we are dealing with at this point in time, many lessons would need to be learned. I discussed the Windsor Framework with the Taoiseach earlier. American support and European solidarity have been vital and it seems that is to continue. We …

The Deputy should have kept talking.

There are two major issues here that have been caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, namely, food security and energy security. I ask for some sort of update on that. There was some conversation around food security and some people were pushing for leeway on certain sections of the sanctions but I want to know where that conversation is developing. I agree with what Deputy Howlin said. If we are going to get serious about energy security, it is all about wind power and renewables. We need to ensure we have the…

I will follow up on that. It is a fair point. Is it possible to have that conversation at an EU Council level? If it is not possible to have that conversation even among some of the states across the European Union, Ireland will have to do an element of heavy lifting in relation to supporting the Palestinians. That will mean progressing the occupied territories Bill, recognising the state of Palestine and dealing with the issue as regards the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund. Allowing the fund to be a shareholder …

When will the Minister treat this emergency like it is an emergency and a crisis, and bring everything to bear to deal with it? We have often heard about Fianna Fáil's history on building houses when the State had no money. The Minister can talk about all the issues that there are from Covid right through to inflation rates and all the rest of it. We all accept that but let us be absolutely clear that the buck stops with the Minister as regards delivering for the people. It is a matter of doing it. People do not ha…

I thank Deputy Stanton for raising the issue. We constantly talk about making places of employment and educational facilities disability friendly. We need an holistic response that goes beyond the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. Earlier this week I spoke to the Minister for Social Protection. I have no doubt I will speak again to the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. We do not have the pieces regarding further education and personal ass…

We are all aware of the need for lifelong learning and upskilling. The Minister has visited my home county, where projects have been run by the Louth and Meath Education and Training Board, LMETB, such as the Advanced Manufacturing Training Centre of Excellence, AMTCE. A huge part of that is engaging with industry. I have a very specific question. A number of employers have spoken about the need for human skills and soft skills, interpersonal skills and communication skills. That is something that is sometimes lack…

I appreciate what the Minister said earlier. Similarly to what has been said previously, an example is the AMTCE dealing with schools and providing training for necessary skills, whether we are talking about welding or a pile of other skills. It is basically embedding that in students at a very young age. That is useful. I would go back to my earlier question. Are we looking at possible modules to train those necessary skills, that is, the human skills, interpersonal skills, soft skills and communication skills tha…

There is significant agreement on the pressure sheep farmers are experiencing. I would even agree with some of what has been said by the Ministers in the sense that farmers are looking for a fair price for their work and product. Unfortunately, that is not the situation they find themselves in. In recent years sheep farmers have had to deal with the collapse of wool prices along with rising input prices, Brexit and other international factors. We know that it does not wash its face as a business at this point in ti…

-----regarding the evils of partition.

Like many others, I am incredibly worried about the eviction ban being lifted. As has been said by others, the Sinn Féin Bill provides one last opportunity for Deputies to vote in the correct way. I ask for clarity on the tenant in situ scheme. Louth County Council is considering purchases for people who have been on the housing list for five years or more, but it has to be the same as they could avail of if they were bidding on choice-based lettings. If there is a room too many or a room too few, as far as I under…