Very good. Hopefully an Irish force commander would be somebody in charge of a force that would not be involved in active military deployment. What I am getting at here is Ireland's neutrality and our role as a neutral nation. That is really what I want to see. How does that work with active deployment? For example, if one of our forces was deployed in Afghanistan, could an Irish soldier be arrested by an American force commander? Is that what the Minister is talking about and is that part of this Bill? The Ministe…

This question relates to the mental health supports that are available to students in the various colleges around the country, particularly in the light of Covid-19 and the extra pressures on young people in terms of their mental health. Studies conducted by USI prior to the Covid-19 outbreak showed that over 25% of students had to wait more than four weeks to see a mental health professional within their colleges. What will be done to make that situation different this year?

As the Minister himself said, access is the key. There is no point in having fantastic mental health services if only 2% of the students who need them can actually access them. USI conducted a survey on access and prior to Covid-19, over 25% of students were waiting more than four to six weeks for mental health supports, which is over half of a term. That was the situation prior to Covid-19 and we are going to see an increase in demand now, given what has been happening. I am doubtful as to whether the €5 million r…

That is vitally important because we must make sure it meets the needs of the students. Figures from USI indicate that 38.4% of students experienced severe levels of anxiety, 29.9% experienced depression and 17.3% experienced stress. That was in the pre-Covid era so we are going to see an increase in all of that. There is also the added difficulty in reaching students and making services available to them when they are not on campus. We must keep a close eye on this to make sure that the funding provided is actuall…

I am sharing time with Deputy Connolly. I had mixed thoughts about the motion when I was considering it earlier, what I would say in my contribution and whether I would support it. Like most Members, I believe the fight that we face against Covid-19 is vitally important. It is very important that everybody is singing from the same hymn sheet and that we go on with it. The risk of withdrawing this statutory instrument in its entirety might be greater than the argument in favour of retaining it but the Government nee…

I was caught on the hop there.

There has been a lot of talk tonight about wishing the Minister of State well and we have spoken a couple of times at this stage already but I wish her well in her role as Minister of State with responsibility for mental health, in particular, because it is a vitally important service. While the Minister of State's intentions might be well and good and she will do her best in this role, unfortunately the Government will not give mental health services the attention they need to ensure they are developed. That will …

Everybody wants to be back here in this House but I do not see the point in having another special meeting. We had a meeting before the recess when all of the experts were in. They basically said that maintaining a 2 m distance cannot be done in this House. We cannot have everybody in this House to vote. That is the reality of the situation. I do not see that changing through having a special meeting next week but if it does, we will participate in it. Unless we can go down to 1 m distancing, there will not be full…

For information, this is a new agenda that has been worked out and imposed by the Business Committee. It relegates all of us parties to a lower standing in respect of both Private Members' business and general business. These are the new rules.

I hope the Leas-Cheann Comhairle will be speaking at some stage. I congratulate Deputy Cullinane of Sinn Féin on the motion. It is very timely and it is important that it has been moved here tonight. The most interesting remark made on the Government side was made by the Minister, who said funding has not materialised and that this needs to change. It is interesting that he said that in his speech, yet the Government's counter-motion on the Order Paper makes no mention of it and lauds the great job the Government i…

As I have five minutes, I will ask my questions and then give the Minister the time to answer them. On his website, the Minister talks about the SUSI grant and he also spoke about it in his introduction today. He wants to reassure people there is scope to address loss of income as part of the grant scheme. I would like the Minister in his response to expand on how people will actually go about accessing that. It had always been the case that there was provision for situations where income changed within the year, b…

Why are they doing that?

The Covid change is important because I know that, in practice, people are not accessing that. With regard to accommodation, there are many private providers of accommodation and students have been caught in the last year and do not want to be caught again. It is an unfair burden and the Minister needs to address it. The Minister referred earlier to laptops. Will there be a clawback from students by the colleges in regard to the costs? I hope there will not be and I would like the Minister to confirm that.

I am sharing time with Deputies Fitzmaurice and McNamara. I wish Deputy McConalogue all the best and congratulate him on his elevation to the position of Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine. I also wish Deputy James Browne the best on his promotion to Minister of State. I have no doubt that the incoming Minister, Deputy McConalogue, will fill the position well and I hope he stays in it longer than the previous two incumbents did. His appointment will be vitally important for Donegal. I do not think Deputy…

I am pleased to have an opportunity to contribute to the debate today on this Bill. It is hardly surprising to the Minister that I will echo the comments that have been made by all the Opposition Members so far about section 14, which deals with business and how vulture funds are being facilitated with court cases that people are contesting. I am not sure whether they have the right to do that and it is vitally important that the section should be taken out of the Bill, as other Members have suggested. That would m…

On a point of order, the amendments that have been put on the Order Paper here today do not deny anybody the right to speak in this House. However, it has always been about the order of speaking. What the Government is proposing to do is to put all their speaking time first and to put everybody else after. That is the problem. That is the reason for the point of order.

There is not an attempt by anybody to deny any Member speaking time in this House. The attempt is by the Government to make sure that it gets all the speaking time first so it can put across its message.

That is all it is about; it is about denying the rights of Members who are as entitled to be here in this House and denying us the right to have our speaking time as an Opposition.

The Government controls the House and this is simply about it using its dominant position to control this House and to put its views across. That is what has happened. It is the first time in 70 or 80 years that this has happened. It is because the Government is frightened by the views that we can put across in this House.

That is the problem with the amendment.