I welcome the opportunity to speak on this review of the local property tax and the legislation that will underpin it. It is important that we support local government with proper funding. I will take some time to speak about Galway County Council in my constituency and its precarious situation in terms of financial support. An expert advisory group on local government arrangements in Galway examined the prospect of amalgamating Galway city and county councils. According to its report dated 26 April 2018, "the Expe…

I move: That Dáil Éireann: recognises: — the views of the members of Dáil Éireann as outlined during the private members’ debate of the 21st October, 2020; — that a sustainable nationwide post office network is a key component of the economic and social infrastructure in both rural and urban areas; — that post offices provide crucial public and financial services to communities all around Ireland, especially to those in rural and isolated areas;1385 — that from 1st July, post offices face a major challenge as a sig…

I am listening to the debate and I am confused. Perhaps I am missing something and maybe I am wrong, but I think we are creating an extra layer in the provision of housing. If houses are coming onto the market, why are the local authorities and the housing associations not purchasing them directly? Is it the case that these investment or pension funds are tied up in the finance of the construction of the houses? Why can we not go in there and buy them? I have a concern about leasing houses for 25 years. That is a g…

I will be brief as I am aware the time is short and I want to allow other Deputies to have their say. I have one concern which the Minister might clarify. It relates to the extension of duration that he will allow for existing projects where substantial works have been done on the ground. I am concerned that there are projects that have not commenced on-site but that may have had money expended on them for enabling works and getting everything lined up to start them, but where they have been delayed. Is there discr…

In light of what has been happening in the past couple of days, I wish to raise the issue of the regions and regional development. Many businesses are suffering right across the country as a result of the pandemic. There are two areas I wish to discuss. Since it was first introduced, the LEADER programme has brought a great amount of positivity to the regions in economic enterprise, job creation and the provision for community groups to be able to access funding for important activities in their areas. We have seen…

I thank the Taoiseach. He rightly pointed out that the LEADER programme has been such a benefit and the money that has been allocated has been spent wisely. I reiterate my request that for 2023 we increase the funding allocation because there is pent-up demand and people see the value of it. With regard to TAPS, it is important to realise that, right now, these family-run nursing homes are under pressure. I know a review of the nursing home sector is ongoing with regard to how it dealt with Covid and how it is bein…

I have concerns about the Land Development Agency and how it will work. My concerns revolve around the fact that we expect it to be a panacea that will change everything in land development and getting land ready for housing. The decision to bypass the local authorities is not a good one. I say that because I see in my county that houses are being built by local authorities and social housing is being built. The most important thing I will say is that, with regard to making land available, a number of things have g…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill and also that we are providing additional time for the completion of county development plans. These plans are the basis for the planning and development of local authority areas for the next five years so we need to provide local authorities with adequate time to get them right. We are now in a situation where housing supply is at crisis point. In that context, I have a number of concerns about county development plans and the way land is zoned. As others have said, …

I welcome this opportunity to speak about the issue of housing. In the few minutes I have, I will concentrate on the serious lack of funding afforded to Irish Water to ensure we have suitable land serviced for development. People are telling me that this lack of resources means Irish Water is becoming an impediment to the delivery of construction and the built environment. Applications for planning permission for significant areas of zoned land in different locations are being deemed premature because inadequate wa…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill and welcome its introduction. It is important at the outset to say we all have our own ideas about what affordability is. For people who are listening it is about the fact that we can build houses. It is about giving affordability to people who are brave enough to want to buy their own houses and to take out a mortgage. It also gives affordability to people who cannot do that and need help from the State. I listened with interest to what Deputy Boyd Barrett was saying…

I thank the Acting Chairman and I welcome the opportunity to speak on this very important subject. As a member of the Joint Committee on Disability Matters, and along with the Minister of State and other Deputies who have spoken earlier, I believe we are doing good work on this committee. It is well supported by the Ministers and Ministers of State and also by the staff. We had a meeting this morning on various issues with Department officials. We are discussing the issue of disabilities and Covid-19 and the full i…

Deputy Murphy may not arrive in time as she is running late. If she does not arrive, I will take the reminder of the time. Housing is probably one of the biggest topics to have come back on the agenda since the advent of Covid in March of last year. I welcome the Labour Party's introduction of this Bill. It is very appropriate we enact policies we believe will make housing more affordable to more people. I know from my experiences over the past ten years that people who have money have been buying land and property…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill. As a rural Deputy, I have no problem with climate action. I believe it is important that we bring about an all-inclusive climate action plan. There are certain aspects to the Bill, however, including the amendment the Regional Group has put down with regard to biogenic methane. It has not been helped by the fact that the amendments are not being taken on board. I have spoken to many people including farmers and farmers' organisations. Many people are of the view that…

I thank the Minister for his comments on farmers. I do not for one minute doubt his total commitment to getting things right but, at the same time, he said this Bill is so well crafted, it cannot be changed, and that is a flaw. Deputy Richard Bruton stated earlier that people will be left behind, I suppose, and that is a fact. People in Gort lost a bus service a couple of weeks ago. That was public transport and the only answer to such a problem now seems to be the private buses. We should think about people who ca…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this issue. I thank Sinn Féin for tabling the motion and I acknowledge the number of people who travelled from Donegal, Mayo and Clare to be here today to voice their opinions. The biggest issue in all of what we are discussing is what went wrong. It is my view that the key issue is the lack of independent building control. Building control is under the remit of our local authorities but local authorities do not have the resources to deal effectively with building control. Ther…

The recovery and resilience plan was announced this week. There are particular issues around small businesses and how they are going to be treated. Many people fell through the net with regard to the supports to date. I ask the Tánaiste to make a statement on the matter.

I thank the Tánaiste. There is an array of supports there and they are all very welcome. I also welcome the fact that he has extended supports for people who are working from home, especially in the digital age, and for catering companies that do not have premises where the public are coming in. That is something that was missing. One of the challenges facing employers right now is the fact that we need to incentivise and encourage them to take on employees. There are business people coming into me in my constituen…

The Tánaiste is saying that there is such an array of different issues out there that we need to ensure we keep on top of them horizontally, across them all. I am disappointed that there is no mention of mental health in the resilience and recovery plan. If we need to restart, to grow and to develop our economy, we need to promote mental health for our people who will build the country. As the WHO has stated, mental health is central in building a healthy, inclusive and productive economy. I trust that the Governme…

I am delighted to speak on this Bill. Our seas have been the poor relation and have been treated as a second-class asset. For generations we looked at the sea as something out there, a place where people went out to fish and that was it. The real potential of our seas has not been realised. We are so lucky that we are an island nation, surrounded by the seas. However, like the timing of this debate during the last shift on a Thursday evening, we have put the seas to the end of the agenda. My colleague Deputy Verona…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill. We all talk about housing and about it being a crisis. The spirit of this Bill is the right of a person to have a home, which we all agree with. The problem with it is, how do we get there? People keep talking about what is wrong and saying that we must find solutions. The Government is investing more money into getting more houses built, but sometimes we look a gift horse in the mouth. I have said this repeatedly, we have so many vacant properties in this county, in…