As the Minister will be aware, last week, Jozef Puska was convicted of the murder of Ashling Murphy. In common with other people convicted of murder in this country, this individual will be able to apply for parole in 12 years. Ten years has elapsed since the Law Reform Commission recommended that in murder cases, the trial judge should be given power to impose a minimum period of incarceration. From reading its report, it is obvious that the commission had in mind especially heinous cases, such as this one and the…

On many occasions I have raised in this House the situation concerning the dire conditions in University Hospital Limerick, UHL. Unfortunately, the situation seems to be getting progressively worse. The Minister for Health has committed to setting up a surgical hub in the mid-west to alleviate the pressure on UHL. I raised this by way of parliamentary question last February and the Minister told me at that time that the project was going ahead and that meetings were taking place about it that very week. Nine months…

I have been approached by a number of people who are living in financial straitjackets because their mortgages were sold to vulture funds without their knowledge or consent. It is impossible for those people to get away from the vulture funds. I made representations to the major financial institutions to take on some of these mortgages for people who have never missed a single instalment, and the answer I received has invariably been "No". They do not want to know. Regardless of what propaganda is put out, that is …

A number of communities in Limerick city are extremely concerned at reports that their community policing service is about to be withdrawn. Regardless of the outcome of the current negotiations on the Garda rosters, I hope this does not come to pass. If it does, it will not happen at a worse time. We are plagued with antisocial behaviour. I know several vulnerable and elderly people who are literally prisoners in their own homes, particularly by night and sometimes by day as well. I raise this matter in the context…

As the Taoiseach will be aware, all the organisations that represent the people that the Government says it is trying to protect by the introduction of the Criminal Justice (Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences) Bill 2022 have grave reservations about the Bill, as drafted. Those reservations, as the Taoiseach will be aware, are widely shared throughout society, including by civil liberties groups, human rights groups, academics, lawyers etc. Will the Government delay the implementation of the Bill unt…

On 21 February, HIQA made an unannounced visit to University Hospital Limerick. The press release about the report arising from that visit stated: The emergency department remained very overcrowded with 72 patients on trolleys and chairs ... This level of overcrowding continued to impact on the privacy and dignity of patients ... Obviously, that is unacceptable. The Taoiseach may or may not be aware that St. John's Hospital in Limerick, which is a hospital in the city centre with an outstanding reputation, has for …

I want to ask the Taoiseach about a problem that has arisen mainly in urban areas. There is a classic example of it in my own constituency. It relates to the impact of traffic noise on people who live in the vicinity of that traffic and the impact it has on their homes and on their lives. There is a well-known system for measuring this and deciding whether the limit has been reached and whether the noise exceeds the permitted limit. When that happens, remediation measures are proposed. The difficulty is that respon…

The unacceptable situation at University Hospital Limerick continues unabated, with unacceptable delays, excessive use of trolleys and so on. The situation is now being compounded by the fact that ICU nurses are on a work-to-rule because of the conditions under which they have to work. At the beginning of this year the Minister for Health committed to providing a surgical hub in the Limerick region to alleviate the situation. What progress has been made on this? We are six months down the road now. Has a location b…

My question is for the Minister for Health. A year and a half has elapsed since the Government announced the payment of a €1,000 pandemic bonus to front-line workers. As late as last January, according to the Irish Examiner , more than half the non-HSE staff among that cohort had not been paid. Remarkably, not everybody has been paid yet, even though the value of the payment has been eroded by inflation over the past year and a half. People are coming to me from various organisations and individually. It is a lamen…

I will ask the Taoiseach about two schemes announced by the Government in conjunction with the ending of the eviction ban. The first is the tenant in situ scheme whereby the local authority can acquire a house with a sitting tenant and rent it back to that tenant at a reasonable rent. The second is the first refusal scheme whereby a tenant has first refusal in the event of a landlord wanting to sell a house. Will the Taoiseach tell me whether those schemes are operational as we speak? For example, can a local autho…

Phase 4 of the job evaluation scheme for HSE support staff, the results of which were announced last October, provides an upgrade in salary and status for the following categories of workers, among others: caretakers, barbers, hairdressers, general operatives and even labourers. However, among those who were not upgraded and who were forced to remain within the same wage structure are laundry workers, household staff, domestic staff and cleaners. On the face of it, this seems bizarre, if not downright discriminator…

I am seeking an assurance the 26 students in Limerick who were not offered a secondary school place will be accommodated, and that this will happen shortly. I also bring to the Taoiseach's attention the fact the selection system in Limerick is badly broken. Imagine the psychological impact on an 11- or 12-year-old of not being offered a school place and getting not fewer than 11 letters of rejection from 11 different schools. That system must change. There is a report locally, which I hope is incorrect, that the ma…

I ask the Taoiseach for an update on the surgical hub, which the Government has committed to provide in the Limerick area. This is a vital facility due to continuing capacity problems in University Hospital Limerick, UHL. I ask the Taoiseach or the Minister for Health, if he wishes to respond, to consider locating this hub in the grounds of St. John's Hospital in Limerick. Can I get an assurance that St. John's Hospital will continue to play a central role in the delivery of health services in the midwest region?

I am sure the Taoiseach will agree that the dedicated mortgage advisers employed by the Money Advice & Budgeting Service, MABS, do a tremendous job at very little cost to the taxpayer, but is he aware that they have no security of tenure? Their contract is simply renewed annually and the practice is to tell them only at the last moment whether or not their contract will be renewed. Obviously, that is very unsatisfactory for the people doing that job. Is the Taoiseach aware also that the budget for this service was …

I thank the Taoiseach for his attendance at a recent meeting concerning University Hospital Limerick. It was much appreciated. Arising from the proceedings of that meeting, will the Taoiseach provide an approximate timescale within which the 303 beds which have been deemed necessary to stabilise the hospital will be in use? When will the elective hub committed to by the Government become operational? Has a building been secured to house that facility or has one been identified? What is the up-to-date situation on a…

Just under two years ago a company called Rehab Logistics in Raheen in Limerick, which provided sheltered employment for vulnerable people, went out of business and made its 38 staff members redundant. At the time, a redundancy package was agreed between the workers and Rehab Ireland and both parties signed off on that. That agreement was subsequently endorsed by the Labour Court and the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC. Now, unfortunately, Rehab Ireland has decided to renege on that agreement and is proposing t…

I am glad that is all cleared up now. The Ceann Comhairle is welcome back. I am delighted to see him. I strongly support the remarks of Deputy Joan Collins in respect of community welfare officers. The net effect of the administrative changes that have been made in that regard has been to make the poor poorer. That is my day-to-day experience of how those changes have worked. I am sure there is a good reason for it, but I and many other Deputies have been confined to three minutes speaking time on the biggest item …

I was not blaming the Ceann Comhairle.

I am blaming a flawed system.

The recent Supreme Court ruling in the Ruth Morrissey case held that women who are suffering from terminal cancer as part of the CervicalCheck fiasco can no longer seek financial provision for their children during their lifetime. They can seek it for themselves but not for their children. The children must bring a separate case after the parent has died. The difficulty lies in section 48(2) of the Civil Liability Act 1961, which provides that in fatal injury cases - the Morrissey case falls into this category - on…