Absolutely. I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the Regional Group. I compliment the Department of Education and both Ministers, Deputy Foley and Deputy Madigan, who are present to listen to what is being said. It has been an unprecedented challenge for everybody in education. Mistakes have been made, but I have yet to see any particular aspect of Covid where mistakes were not made along the line. The main point is that a lot of lessons have been learned. I am a member of the Joint Committee on …

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this very important topic. Again, we have put the survivors at the centre of attention nationally for the wrong reasons and poured more pain onto them. In terms of the amount of correspondence I have had on this issue in the past two weeks, it is the single biggest issue that has come to my office in a long time. It is important that we stop and think about what we are actually doing. I welcome the motion put down by the Social Democrats. I welcome the fact that the Government …

I raise the issue of the Local Government Fund and how it is distributed to the local authorities. In particular, I raise the issue of Galway County Council, which is so poorly funded it is on life support at present. It is overwhelmed with work and does not have the resources to carry it out. As a result, services will be affected. Geographically, it is the second largest county in Ireland with a diverse range of services from the islands to the Gaeltacht and to the east, in my constituency. There has been talk of…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Land Development Agency Bill. I have concerns about it, none more than my belief that the agency will become a provider of houses in the cities and suburban areas but it will not do much for constituencies like Galway East. I also have reservations about taking power from councillors, which is anti-democratic, so we must consider its impact. When I speak about my constituency and housing, my first argument is that the private housing market is dysfunctional because develope…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this very important issue. The cost of insurance is always on people's minds, whether it be car insurance, home insurance or business insurance. People do not know from year to year what their premium will be. They have no stability in terms of the cost of insurance, whether it is home insurance or other insurance. The idea that a person can go online to get a better deal when he or she gets his or her motor insurance renewal is fine, but those who do not have that access yet, …

I wish to raise an issue that affects many people throughout the country. It relates to the community employment, CE, schemes in place that offer so much in terms of service throughout society. They are embedded in everything we do. In July 2017 the community employment policy unit changed the rules relating to the length of time a participant who is over 55 years of age can remain on the scheme without taking a break. Up to that point, a person over 55 years could work their full lifetime entitlement of six years …

I would welcome the opportunity to meet the Minister, Deputy Humphreys. She is a Minister for whom I have great regard and she understands the situation. While Department officials are looking at this, people are getting notice to go off the schemes. I know of one particular gentleman who has been told that he will finish the scheme in March and then he has to go back to his Intreo office. He has six months left in his working life before he gets the pension. It would be more prudent for that man to remain on the s…

I wish to raise the issue of driving licences. Are the Minister and Minister of State aware of the service being provided by the Road Safety Authority to learner drivers and those seeking to renew their driving licences during this pandemic? Are they aware that learner drivers who booked a test as far back as June 2020 still do not have a test date? Are they aware that learner drivers are regularly on hold for 90 minutes trying to get through to the Road Safety Authority? Are they aware that emails are not being re…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this very important issue. I acknowledge the work that has been done in expanding the fuel allowance and the timeframe in which it has been allocated to people. The reality is that this winter has been particularly tough on many people who could not leave their homes to exercise and warm themselves up, especially older people who are cocooning. This winter has seen significant stress on many people because the fuel allowance they were being given was not enough to cover their c…

I have a number of questions for the Minister. The questions are coming from people in my constituency who are asking when they may be vaccinated. They include, for instance, people who have cystic fibrosis and their carers, people with Down's syndrome and their carers, people who are on dialysis and people who suffer from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. People in those four groups have been on to my office wondering whether they can be brought forward up the chain of command. Ability West in Galway sent a s…

I have a short statement and a few questions. I do not want to repeat what others have said. I thank the Minister for fielding all the questions this morning. From my constituency point of view, what is missing is the fact we do not have a clear programme. We have a plan but we should have a programme. A programme would include where we are getting our supplies from, when we expect them, how we are going to distribute them and how we are going to reach our target in September. It is being rolled out and I congratul…

I wish to ask about the nursing homes support scheme (amendment) Bill. When can we expect that legislation to come before the House? Will it be backdated to when the Bill was introduced in 2019? The Bill seeks to protect family farms and family businesses and to cap their obligations under the scheme to three years.

I welcome the State apology by the Taoiseach. I also welcome the words of the Tánaiste and the Minister. These apologies have come today, but they are long overdue. I also welcome the announcement of an apology by the Sisters of Bon Secours earlier, particularly regarding the mother and baby home in my home town of Tuam. I also welcome the apology made today by the Archbishop of Tuam, Michael Neary. I have not yet read the full report because it is impossible to read a report like this without taking bits of it at …

My question is on the LEADER programme. Yesterday, the Minister announced some transitional funding for the programme, which I welcome, but I would like her to expand on what will happen in 2021 and 2022 before the new programme is in place, bearing in mind its importance and the work carried out by all the LEADER companies over the past five years, which the Minister will know about from her constituency.

I thank the Minister for the update. I have a few questions on it. She announced €20 million nationally and she says this is an initial fund. Taking as an example Galway Rural Development, which is in my constituency, Galway East, the last programme would have given it an average budget of €1.15 million per annum. The allocation announced by the Minister yesterday gives it €695,000. I know how the scheme works from my time in the Department and there is demand for it. The money is welcome as an initial allocation b…

I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiment and thank the Minister for that. The importance of this scheme to rural Ireland is enormous. In Galway East, the budget for the past five years was €5,728,456, from which 170 community projects have benefited. By 31 December, the allocations will have been made to 170 projects. That is an enormous amount of money. Some 25 projects will have received €934,000 for enterprise development. Seventeen projects in rural tourism will have received €563,000, and so on. There is not …

It is a bit of a shock to the system that we must pay out €50 million for nothing. What I mean is there is no return to us. We are paying €50 million to two other countries, namely, Denmark and Estonia, for the privilege of having a piece of paper to say we met our requirements. As has been said, €50 million is a lot of money. The main thing I will say is that is this year; it is 2020. What will we be paying out next year? We need to look at this in a sobering way to see exactly what we are doing and, more appropri…

I am sharing time with Deputy Tóibín. I welcome the opportunity to speak to the motion and thank the Rural Independent Group for bringing it forward. I pay my respects to the 2,134 people who have lost their lives through Covid and acknowledge the suffering that all their families have endured this year. The 76,766 people who have contracted Covid have also suffered a great deal. We have to acknowledge what people have done to try to contain this virus and pandemic. It has been an enormous sacrifice, with many aspe…

I wish to raise an issue with the Taoiseach regarding the temporary wage subsidy scheme, TWSS, which was introduced last March to help small businesses, and all businesses, to try to keep their employees and the employers connected in order that they would not have to go onto social welfare or be let go from work. When this scheme was introduced, it was a very good scheme and helped a lot of businesses to stay afloat. However, I now have some cases coming to me in which, when Revenue did some checks, it found that …

I thank the Taoiseach for his positive reaction. The important thing is that when these businesses were availing of the scheme, Revenue stated that it did not consider that any business needed to take professional advice or assistance in proving to the satisfaction of Revenue that the criteria were met. It was stated that Revenue would validate some employer eligibility for the scheme but, in so doing, it would adopt a reasonable, fair and pragmatic approach in considering whether the criteria had been met. That is…