I am taking this Commencement matter on behalf of my colleague the Minister for Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan. I thank Senator Lynn Boylan for raising this topic. The EPA is responsible for compiling the inventories of greenhouse gas emissions for Ireland and for reporting data to the relevant European and international institutions. As such, Ireland's legal reporting obligations require that the agency submits data to the European Commission and the United Nations Framework Convention …

I thank the Deputy for his further remarks. The managing coastal change report has now been finalised. I am not sure what was said on the previous occasion. It will be submitted to the Government very shortly. The report is finalised and is not still being worked on. I mention that particularly. It is clear that tackling coastal change management in response to climate change will be complex and multifaceted. A range of research, policy and consequent management responses will be required. Even with comprehensive m…

I understand the point the Senator is making relates to the wealth of the people who are contributing to emissions rather than how the tax take is distributed. In fairness, every local authority is doing retrofitting schemes for its tenants - well, they should be and most of the ones I know are doing it. If a local authority is not doing it, that needs to be tackled and the chief executive should be contacted. A lot of the retrofitting, whether through attic insulation or other schemes, was for people of an older g…

I am taking this matter on behalf of my colleague, the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Anne Rabbitte. I thank the Senator for raising this important issue for discussion in the House. I have listened very carefully to the cases she has raised. These ultimately are the type of issues that must be raised in the national Parliament but if everything was working as plan, we would not need to have these discussions here. Clearly, from the evidence produced by the Senator, it is very necessary that …

The Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, and her Department are aware of the challenges being faced around the delivery of additional capacity in the areas of respite and residential care services. The review of the disability social care demand and capacity requirements to 2032 was published in 2021. An action plan for disability services has been prepared to progress action on the findings developed by an interdepartmental working group. There have been some delays in publishing this draft plan and the Minister of…

I am speaking on behalf of the Minister of State, Deputy Calleary, who was at a committee earlier and who asked me to stand in for him. In his contribution to the debate, the Minister of State, Deputy Richmond, detailed the Government's proposal for a timed amendment of 12 months for the Bill to allow for the conclusion of an in-depth examination of the national minimum wage's sub-minima rates by the Low Pay Commission. The sub-minima rates are provided for under the National Minimum Wage Act 2000 and the National …

Dóchas is the Irish association of non-governmental development organisations. Its mission is to enable international development and humanitarian organisations in Ireland to achieve greater impact in their work by working together. The Tánaiste and I met Dóchas and the CEOs of key Irish international NGOs on 22 February 2023. I was keen to meet with these stakeholders as a group as early as possible in my new role and had earlier held bilateral meetings with each of the CEOs who were at that meeting. The OECD has …

I thank the Deputy for the seven questions there. I will be as brief as I can. The sector acknowledged the difficulty in areas where there have been humanitarian crises. In some areas, it has set back the development work undertaken over previous years and we have to work to rebuild that, especially in relation to the earthquake in Turkey and Cyprus. Ireland was the first out to offer €10 million of aid immediately on the weekend that happened. We all recall the death of 30 GOAL workers in Syria who were from Syria…

I met representatives of their organisation, Front Line Defenders, and especially people who are providing information on the ground and who want to keep a low-key presence in some of these countries so as not to be identified. We are making efforts to ensure their safety continues. Another point is that at our meeting with Dóchas, we specifically raised the issue, following my bilateral meeting, that there be board representation on the Irish NGOs from the southern hemisphere, where we are delivering so much aid d…

She has changed roles.

The Government is deeply concerned by the continued threat posed by terrorism and violent extremism to peace and security around the world, including on the African continent. The recent UN report referred to by the Deputy makes the case clearly that terrorism and violent extremism, in addition to destroying lives, undermines development gains and threatens to hold back progress for generations to come. The report also notes the unique role for development projects in addressing structural drivers of poverty, food …

Regarding the Sahel region and western Africa, I visited Senegal with the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins, earlier this year. It was a very productive visit in terms of his and our relationship with the 34 African nations represented at that meeting. We have a very strong record of supporting development work in the Horn of Africa and dealing with the humanitarian challenges in Somalia, and especially in Sudan. I intend to visit Malawi in the next week or so for a week to see first-hand the level of povert…

Before I respond to the Senator, I wish to put on record the fact that a phenomenal number of passports were issued by the passport service last year because demand was unprecedented. I expect demand this year will be equally as strong. I visited some of the staff in the service along with the call centre in Limerick recently where 48 people are working flat out answering calls. On the day I was down there, the centre received 3,000 phone calls and handled them expertly. I thank the professional staff across the pa…

I thank the Senator for the reasonable point he has made. The issue of security has, in a way, trumped the valid points he makes. One can also understand and appreciate cases, and I am sure we all know of such cases, where parents fall out and they have been through courts and through separation. Perhaps one parent is not allowed to have access to his or her own son or daughter, as the case may be. The idea that just because a parent's name is on the passport it might help him or her get through a security check is…

I am taking this matter on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Humphreys. I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. The school meals programme funds the provision of food to some 1,600 schools and organisations, benefitting 260,000 children. The objective of the programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to enable them to take full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extr…

I understand the point the Deputy makes and the level of interest for the school meals programme is a clear sign of the need for its expansion. It is something the Minister for Social Protection is prioritising. The issues being highlighted today are being prioritised by the Minister. As part of the measures announced by the Government last week, access to the hot school meals is being extended to the remaining 372 DEIS primary schools and all special schools from September. I stress that. There are not as many spe…

I thank the Senator for raising this important issue. It is the topic that is first and foremost on most people's minds throughout the world at the moment following the disaster of the earthquake in Türkiye and Syria in recent days. It was an unexpected shock and it caused a significant number of deaths to date. Unfortunately, the death toll is rising on a daily basis. In the first week or so following the earthquake, the emphasis is on recovering people buried under the rubble and all agencies are working to that …

As the Senator rightly pointed out, there are additional difficulties in northern Syria because of the war there, which has been going on for years. It is hard to know who is in control of the region. There is a government in place but it is not strong in the region.

That is specifically why we are working through the United Nations Syria Cross-border Humanitarian Fund. They are the only people who are accepted in the region by all sides. They are seen as neutral and independent with a humanitarian remit. Anyone else trying to get in there would be counterproductive. This is the group through which we are working. The €2 million we announced at the weekend is an initial allocation and we want to see what the demand is. We know it is substantial but we want to hear from the agen…

I thank Senator O'Loughlin for raising this important matter concerning the Defence Forces. As she is from Newbridge in County Kildare, she knows more about the Defence Forces and has more contact with its members and their families than any other Member of the Oireachtas given her proximity to the Curragh. Her knowledge of the Defence Forces is vastly superior than that of most other Members. The Government and people of Ireland are rightly proud of our peacekeepers. We have a long and distinguished history of pea…