When?

When?

We warned the Government that child and adolescent mental health services suffered during the Covid pandemic. We were given repeated commitments that efforts were being made, plans were being drafted, funds were being allocated and that the issue would be sorted. Things are now worse than ever before. There are 276 children in CH04 who have been waiting for more than 12 months. This is by far the largest number of children on waiting lists in the State. Before Christmas, a constituent contacted me. She had to take …

To follow on from my party colleague, Deputy Ó Murchú, there is an opportunity here and we hope the Taoiseach, having returned to the office, will grasp it with the shared island unit. We call on the Government to consider a citizens' assembly on Irish unity because we believe we need to plan for this. We are not looking to push any community to where they do not want to go. The Taoiseach last week made some very conciliatory comments when he reached out to the unionist community, and that is what we want to do as …

This Bill is long overdue. The consequences of the delay have been significant for many families. I commend the proposed soft opt-out for organ donation. It is positive and could be hugely beneficial, provided we see enough resourcing. Often good policies fail because of poor implementation or support. I do not want to see that happen here because this Bill can make a significant difference. I want to talk mainly to the incineration scandal in CUMH. In 2020, the organs of 18 deceased babies were sent to Belgium for…

Hear, hear.

Once again, Fine Gael has shown its true colours. It is the party of privatisation, its political allies are rich investment funds and the only reason it cares about the environment relates to whether it can make a euro out of it. I am deeply concerned, as are many of my constituents. I recently dealt with Coillte in regard to a forest near Watergrasshill that has been sold to a private company, which will turn the forest into a site for agricultural composting. The locals who walk in and explore the forest with th…

It is like the housing crisis.

There are 166,000 vacant homes. Many are homes that people could live in and where they could raise families. Instead, this Government is leaving them idle, empty and rotting. When the Government tells us it is serious about tackling climate change, I ask how serious it is. It is serious enough about making ordinary people struggle to pay prices, taxes and unfair carbon taxes but it is not serious about tackling the wealthy speculators who are hoarding homes in the middle of a housing crisis. There are no simple fi…

I welcome the increase in the social housing thresholds. This was long overdue. For many people, this will make a difference. I come from the Harbour View Road in Knocknaheeny, which is a social housing estate. The provision of social housing gives people, especially working-class people, the opportunity to have homes of their own. My father still lives in Knocknaheeny. He was able to buy his house under the tenant purchase scheme, and my two sisters and I were able to buy or build our own houses. What was importan…

The Minister, Deputy Ryan, said yesterday we cannot be certain what any energy company will do. We absolutely can be certain. We can make sure we are certain. We can meet with them, put the hard questions to them and tax their huge profits through a windfall tax. We have been calling for such a tax for months, and it was not until Europe brought it in that the Government finally considered it. It is something we should have been doing but the Government hid behind Europe again when it had no right to do so. When we…

There is an explicit and important recognition of the value of the work our environmental NGOs do in the planning process, whether through European Union directives or the Aarhus Convention. Traditionally, this aspect has been reflected in their treatment by the Government and in the legislative process. The Oireachtas housing committee engages with environmental NGOs on pre-legislative scrutiny of schemes and their unparalleled expertise inform the report ultimately produced by the committee. However, by the time …

We have been in here for the past two and a half years doing everything we can to be constructive and encourage the Minister and Department to deliver housing as quickly as possible. That is the way we want to come at things but I have concerns about this. To touch on a point Deputy O’Callaghan made, I come from Knocknaheeny. It is a huge regeneration project. Whether it is Knocknaheeny, Moyross or Ballymun, hundreds of millions are being spent on the regeneration of communities that were badly designed at the star…

I have nothing against the Minister personally but I have something against his policies and plans because they have not worked. He has been in office for two and half years and I have listened to everyone describe all that the Government has done. I will tell this Government about families. A lady contacted me, a mother and grandmother, who cannot close the door of her bedroom because she has had to put another bed in there to put her grandchild in because her daughter has nowhere to live. I know another lady who …

The only problem is-----

The Minister is Santy Claus.

How many homeless people are there in the Minister's constituency?

It would be a good start.

You gave them a big bonus last week.

The Government did not spend the allocation this year.