Question No. 79 asks how the Minister intends to implement the recommendation of the Commission on the Defence Forces for the enhancement of Defence Forces structures across the cyber domain. Can the Minister also tell us what the plans are on cybersecurity and the role of the Defence Forces in that, which most people think should be central to it?

I welcome that response. In building up this cyber capability, will the reality of the need to attract very skilled people into this space in the military be taken into account in laying out the type of salary levels and conditions that these people will work under? If one wants to attract and retain very high quality people, one will have to pay the competitive wage for such people from outside of the military.

I take it that the Minister would accept that in the past, certain specialists had special salaries, for example medical personnel, and so forth, within the military. Otherwise, they would not have been attracted to work in that sector because of the salaries available outside of it for people so qualified. Can I take it that the rates that would be set for people like this with very high levels of skills will be equivalent to those in the private sector? I wish to put on record that I welcome the decision that PDF…

It is the third time I have had to raise this issue in this House. I keep getting the same answers. I have also tabled parliamentary questions. The first thing we have to recognise is that transport costs take a disproportionate amount of islanders' incomes. In many cases, they need to keep two cars – one on the island and one on the mainland. Only two islands have roll-on roll-off, ro-ro, ferries. Every time they go to the mainland, they have to take public transport. The rest of us do not, but they do. It was in …

The next part of the Minister of State's reply will state that unlike the PSO route managed by the NTA, the Department of Rural and Community development does not subsidise all services on all routes. The NTA does not subsidise all services on all routes. Let us put that one to bed. Expressway and all sorts of private services are not subsidised. They are not subject to the reduction in fares. The second issue is that the Minister says many islands have subsidised and non-subsidised services. I would like him to ou…

The problem is there are not many islands that have these services.

Every time I fail to get a passport for somebody, I think of the unique and serious situations involved. People must travel sometimes for funerals and other times for holidays, but costs and disappointment are always involved in these cases. We should never lose sight of the human situations that arise when people do not get the service. I notice that the State often requires people to do things within 28 days or 14 days or the service will not be provided. Therefore, we owe it to the people to provide efficient se…

Looking at systems, the vast majority of people, as the Minister rightly points out, do not have to come to us. When a system is operating like that, one always looks for the part of the system that is failing and where the logjams are occurring. I think most of us would say that an awful lot of the logjams relate to children. It seems to me basic, therefore, that if that is correct, a systems analysis be done and any passport for a juvenile should be pre-validated very early in the process. With computers nowadays…

On 17 June last, the rich states, including the EU, killed a vaccine waiver despite the fact that President von der Leyen of the European Commission said that vaccines will be our common good. She said that two years ago. The EU Council president last year said that immunisation is a global public good. The reality is that only 18% of the poor countries have received the first vaccine compared with 80% of the affluent countries. What are we in Ireland going to do to play our part, irrespective of what the EU has do…

Can the Tánaiste assure me that the Government will oppose any move by the EU to amend the taxonomy for fossil fuels? The proposal being made is to add fossil gases, including possibly fracked gas, to the list of investments that should be considered green up to 2030. It seems to be a total contradiction of all the policies of this Government.

Chuir mise ceist Dála scríofa síos le haghaidh freagra ar 10 Bealtaine i nGaeilge agus ní bhfuair mé freagra i nGaeilge fós ar an gceist sin. B’fhéidir go dtógfaidh an tAire an cheist sin anois. Ceist Uimh. 875 a bhí ann agus bhí sí curtha ag an Roinn Talmhaíochta, Bia agus Mara. The programme for Government commits to implementing the Galway transport strategy, which was published as recently as 2016. My understanding is that the Minister has organised a review of this strategy before it is even implemented. First…

I am pleased to get an opportunity to speak on this. I will try to cover a lot of different topics. First, I welcome that finally the system, including the universities which have been pushing this hard, has been told that its option, the loan option, is not on the table. I remember during the 2000s, when I was in the Government. The summer is a good time to try to put a memo through. I remember one summer a memo was circulated but I was away. I sat down and sent back a very strong note saying that having read the …

It is extraordinary that we are dealing in part with 19th century legislation and with the fact that only part of the 2015 Act was implemented. It is frustrating that our ability to update legislation in good time seems to be very limited. Approximately ten years ago, the current Attorney General undertook a massive amount of work in trying to eliminate all pre-1922 legislation from the Statute Book. It is absolutely amazing that there is still legislation from that era. I do not know if there is any left but he ha…

Unfortunately, this debate is far too short and I only have two minutes to contribute. I will try to be brief. I have been a strong advocate of public transport. I must say that the inaction over years by the Department of Transport and the NTA on simple issues that could be done immediately has been absolutely staggering. There was a consultation on Connecting Ireland but we do not have any buses. I have been asking Ministers, including the present Minister, and the NTA if they have done any scientific analysis or…

It is with deep regret that I raise this issue again, along with my colleague, Deputy Fitzmaurice. We raised it some time ago and were given assurances that work was ongoing on the matter. I then submitted a parliamentary question on it. To say the reply was opaque and less than satisfactory would be putting it mildly. We are talking about a Bill that had passed the Dáil and the Seanad, where some amendments were made, and fell because an election was called in the beginning of 2020. This is basically an Aladdin's …

Perhaps the Minister of State will confirm whether the Bill will be recommenced in the Dáil or whether there is going to be a new Bill with the same information in it, just to go through the procedure ab initio . It seems to me that if there were this much difficulty with the Standing Orders, the best thing to do would have been to reprint the Bill, title it the wildlife (amendment) Bill 2020 - we had hoped it would be 2020 but the year is now 2022 - and bring it back to the House, with whatever examination of amen…

Will the Minister of State give us an indication as to how many amendments were made in the Seanad?

I thank the Ceann Comhairle.

Tá áthas orm cúpla focal a rá ar an ábhar seo. Years ago, I was selling fencing stakes and ran out of them. A purchaser who was looking for a lorryload of fencing stakes in a hurry rang me. I started to explain the problems I faced with supply and so on. He told me that was not his problem. He said he was not looking for excuses; he was looking for fencing stakes. The same thing could be said about the people looking for a passport. We can give all the statistics and reasons but people have to go abroad, for whatev…

My second point about the system is that when the application gets to printing stage, it is absolutely critical that the tracking system is kept up to date with news about when the passport will hit the post. If it is going to hit the post today, the applicant will have it tomorrow because the postal service is very good. That is when people are most dependent on the tracking system. I thank the Minister of State. I am sure there are a lot of solutions available. We need to become solutions-based, analyse the probl…