Once again, this is a Bill that has had to be brought before the Dáil because the Irish Government persists with this illusion that people have the right to union representation. It is Orwellian that you have the right to join a union but your employer does not have to recognise it, so you really do not have a right. If the Government is serious about workers' rights, this is a key one. In the early 1980s, about 60% of our workforce were in unions. Now it is one in four. The trade union movement is largely becoming…

We cannot wait.

Survivors of sexual and gender-based violence have been for many years seeking a ban on counselling notes being used in trials because it is so traumatising and damaging. This weekend, Jacqueline Connolly, the sister of Clodagh Hawe, who was murdered along with her children by her husband, spoke about a priest who pleaded confessional privilege who had vital information relating to those crimes but was able to not give that information by the laws of the State. We have a situation where victims of gender-based viol…

We need an end to this practice, not to leave it in the hands of a judge.

The mere fact-----

-----one's counselling notes can be seized is what is traumatic and damaging.

I am just finishing the sentence.

I was interrupted because they were all talking during it.

I was not sure if the Taoiseach could hear me, so I stopped.

And it is not good enough. It is not ending the practice. It is just-----

But they clearly are.

Care of older people is very important and is generally privatised in terms of nursing homes. The workers who provide this service in nursing homes are essential workers. Many of them were brought over on a special work permit in which the Government was involved. I ask the Taoiseach on a humanitarian basis to listen to the issues raised by these workers. Their wages are too low to allow them to bring their families here, who, by the way, they can support; nobody is asking for any handout. There are so many criteri…

The UK Supreme Court judgment on the definition of a woman impacts trans and intersex people in Northern Ireland. Many of them are living in fear and being driven out of public life, which is the intent of the judgment. The DUP has said that it will look at guidelines for schools, which means there could be further attacks on the rights of trans people. Many of these are eligible to be citizens of Ireland should they so choose. There has also been a ban on trans healthcare in the North. Yesterday, People Before Pro…

Would the Minister agree that his Government's record on housing over the first 100 days has been an unmitigated disaster? A total of 15,376 people are in emergency accommodation, housing completions are down by 6.7% and social and affordable targets are down by 18%. These are figures that the Government knew about before the election but has not yet explained why it stayed quiet about them. To top it all off, search parties have to be sent out for the housing Minister because nobody has a clue who he is. Before he…

With regard to the issues raised about the favoured candidate for the post, the question was whether the Government will investigate these issues, even if the Minister does not want to answer them right now. We do not need a housing tsar to contact Fingal County Council, have a meeting, discuss its needs and then organise the payment for whatever needs to be done. We do not need a housing tsar. It is not as if this has not been done before. Previous Fianna Fáil governments did this in harder times in the 1960s, 197…

Have those meetings taken place? If they have not, will the Minister organise that they will take place?

Has the Minister met the councils?

You do not do anything about it.

We need action.

This is one of the most upsetting things that has happened in this country that anyone here is likely to be speaking on for a long while. Grace, as she has been called, was intellectually and physically disabled after complications at birth. She is non-verbal and was born to a teenage mother in a mother and baby home. That is a very difficult start in life. She was then placed in foster care, that is, the care of the State. Grace lived with a foster family in the south east of the country for ten years after concer…