I have been watching some of Sinn Féin's messaging on social media. It is almost a new style; a new approach. There was a beautiful one this morning about Eoin Ó Broin and his legislation on water and how Eoin had signed it. The Deputy opposite does it with a kind of "I wonder where that came from?" It was as if an executive order had been signed by Deputy Ó Broin in terms of water charges. I come in today and see that we are the do-nothing Government. That sounds familiar, but I suppose people have to keep on learning and innovating in terms of political opposition. We want to establish Oireachtas committees. We are not holding that up in any shape or form. I respectfully suggest that the Deputies opposite agree to the formation of committees and not get in the way of them being formed. Government is getting on with it. We will continue to do what we have to do in respect of decisions. We have a parliamentary system here. We have a legislative Chamber. We should be passing legislation. We can do it by plenary session if we have to and we will in terms of legislation that will come forward. We will pass it through the House. If Opposition Deputies do not want to form committees and want to be a barrier to the formation of committees, that is their business.
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However, we will get legislation done here through plenary methods, but we will engage.
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My understanding is that all the Whips agreed the Dáil calendar. I know we have these empty soundbites coming up that since November we have only met so many times. There was a government being formed since November as Deputy Tóibín knows well, but he just ignores it.
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To be fair to him, he did not play a meaningful role in the formation of Government. I acknowledge that. He was an observer of what was going on.
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In the modern era, it takes a long time to form a government. It was actually much shorter this time than in 2020 when I think it took five or six months.
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This time it was much shorter and probably much shorter than most other European Union member states. By the way, I do not like having a prolonged timeline in terms of the formation of Government. Let us be honest with the public that many Deputies were in here in November, December and January trying to put a government together and trying to get the substance of a programme for Government together, and that happened. Let us not denigrate politicians for the sake of an empty electoral soundbite to make the Deputy look good.
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In response to Deputy Collins, private nursing homes are not covered by section 39. As he knows there is a separate financial mechanism. The National Treatment Purchase Fund is the mechanism through which private nursing homes get funded. I agree with him that it was a welcome development that the section 39 issue was resolved through the pay talks. Deputy Gibney raised the issue of the European Council. As we have in previous Councils and in the Foreign Affairs Council, we have always sought to get the strongest language possible in terms of the appalling atrocities in Gaza and the shocking bombings of the last 48 hours leading to so many innocent children, men and women being killed which is an abhorrence. We will do what we can.
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Others in Europe have a separate perspective.
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Ireland's fundamental principles on the Middle East remain and have not changed or deviated in any shape or form.
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In terms of the Sacred Heart school-----
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Sorry, I thought I could respond to-----
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I believe the issue Deputy Murphy raised is resolved. The Department has been trying to engage with the school for quite a while since December. It referred the school to the financial support services unit in December. The Department was awaiting information. I think Deputy Lahart was proactively involved in trying to get the issue resolved. I hope we can get it finally and comprehensively resolved.
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First of all, I condemn the horrendous atrocity over the last two days in terms of the bombing of innocent men, women and children. I have not briefed anything of the sort the Deputy suggested. Again, if she had consulted me, she might have got the truth, but she decides just to go for the propaganda. That is what it is about. In my remarks in the Oval Office, I very succinctly articulated Ireland's position-----
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-----on the Middle East, and it is on the record. For the life of me, I will never understand why Deputy McDonald did not go to Capitol Hill.
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The reason I will never understand it is-----
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-----that the Deputy has many friends-----
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-----on Capitol Hill. She has many funders in America who have funded her organisation. She has many business contacts.
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She meets with many developers in the United States. I think the reason she did not go to the United States is that she did not want to face them in respect of the different American perspective on the Middle East.
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I have no issue with going and articulating the fundamental principled stance Ireland has taken.
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The Deputy dodged it deliberately and decided to stay at home, which I think was a mistake and robs her of any credibility in attacking me or criticising me in respect of this issue.
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Again, I did not do that in any shape or form. In any interactions I had, I articulated that the programme for Government was progressing the occupied territories Bill. I made that very clear and I listed out all the actions we had taken, which are well known to the House. Fundamentally, however, it seems to me that Prime Minister Netanyahu, irrespective of what gets said here or what gets said in Europe, is hell-bent on his own political survival at an horrendous cost to innocent children and civilians within Gaza. We have consistently called for a ceasefire from the get-go, being one of the first European Union countries to do so. Our view is that that ceasefire needed to be consolidated - on both sides, by the way. I think Hamas's behaviour during the first phase was reprehensible also and how it has treated hostages has been reprehensible. All hostages should be released now unconditionally, in my view. Equally, however, the war should stop. It is morally bankrupt to bomb children to their death in the manner that has happened in the past two days.
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No, I did not, but I am interested in how the Deputy is conflating the Bord Pleanála decision - I hope she accepts that An Bord Pleanála is an independent body-----
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I am just making the point that I hope that everybody accepts that it is an independent body. Its decision should not be conflated with an earlier decision of the Government in respect of energy security, which is required. The legal opinion, by the way, to the previous Minister, which is on file in the Department, is such that, legally, it is not possible to prohibit fracked gas as to what comes in, including through the British gas pipelines that come into Ireland, from where we get most of our gas. It is not legally possible in terms of the source of various gases we import. We import the vast majority and we then have the Corrib gas field. We have done no U-turn. In fact, in the previous Government, proposals had been prepared around a national gas security reserve. Why was this? It was because if anything happened to those pipelines, the Irish economy and society would be in deep trouble. It is as simple as that. I put the energy security question to the entire House. Are people suggesting we do not have any security at all or any backup?
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There is full transparency. The Government took a decision and announced it, you know.
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The energy security piece is separate to An Bord Pleanála's decision.
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I did not say that.
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The engagement and the visit to the US honours a long tradition of celebrating Irish America and the role it played in the building of America and the historic ties that exist. I know the Deputy would prefer if they had never existed because, in fairness to her, she has had a very consistent anti-American position for decades.
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Irrespective of who is President, that has been the Deputy's position, but there are very significant economic links with the US. Thousands of Irish-----
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Over------
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I am sorry. The Deputy asked me a question about my trip to the US and if I thought it was this, that and the other. I just wish to make a very fundamental point. Hundreds of thousands of jobs in this country depend on that economic relationship. Many workers out there are working in multinational companies and so on.
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Well, the Deputy did.
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The Deputy did ask me about that.
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I did. I publicly stated my position on Conor McGregor, but the Deputy asked me how did the trip go and did I think it was a success and so on.
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Sure, I am not getting a chance-----
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The Deputy also twisted it a lot to suit her own agenda.
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In my view, she did not ask it in an honest, upfront or truthful manner either.
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I have no truck with the-----
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-----masculine toxicity of Mr. McGregor, but he is not a Member of this House.
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I do not want to give him any-----
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I just want to say on the peace front, I genuinely believe that we need an end to both wars. I have said this repeatedly. It is a fact of record that President Trump's envoy did act very effectively in terms of getting the ceasefire in the first instance. That is documented, along with the work of President Biden's envoy. On Ukraine, it is-----
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Now, I am disappointed with what happened yesterday. It is not sufficient at all what happened yesterday in terms of a ceasefire, but Europe needs an end to the Ukrainian war on a sustainable and fair basis and all of us in Europe are pursuing that end.
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The Deputy has raised a fair point, although some planning permissions do get through in west Cork, as the Deputy acknowledges. I think the guidelines do need some review, especially concerning people on farms and the children of farming communities, to maintain a sustainable community in certain areas. This is particularly the case with the improvements in technology, wastewater and so on. Again, on the other side of the coin, if we have too much of this, then we will have what happened in Storm Éowyn, where many people in very remote areas were bereft of services. It does, therefore, create challenges as well for our communications system and electricity grid. We cannot ignore the implications. I know the Deputy is not suggesting this, but if we had a free-for-all situation, then we would have fairly significant challenges emerging fairly quickly after that.
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I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. I appreciate the concerns of and pressures on the parents in his constituency. At the moment, the school transport scheme sees about 172,000 children transported daily in approximately 7,900 vehicles across 10,300 routes. It is a very complex scheme. It includes over 143,800 pupils travelling on primary and post-primary services. There are also the special education needs services and so forth. In the context of the review of the scheme, a total of 14 pilot projects are under way this school year and funding has been provided for them. Essentially, however, we need to get through the completion of those pilots with a view to lessons being learned for application across the system. I do not understate what is required here or the challenges that will be involved. They will be significant.
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I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. There will be a decision made before the end of the month and clarity and certainty brought to this topic. I think it needs to be said, though, that it has been a very generously resourced scheme by the Government. It has played a very significant role in accommodating Ukrainians fleeing from war. Originally, it started out at €400. It went up to €800. The Minister will bring clarity to that before the end of the month.
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I pay tribute to the Minister of State, Deputy Michael Moynihan, who has spent a lot of time over the past number of days meeting parents and schools-----
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The Deputy asked a question.
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People need to learn.
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All I want to say is the Minister of State, Deputy Moynihan, met schools, the ETB and parents. He is fully on top of this issue. He realises the challenges. He is fully determined, along with me and the Government, to get this issue resolved for parents before September.
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The technology is one thing. The use of the technology and who uses is the issue.
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That technology, I understand, was used to solve a murder case. It is very positive-----
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-----that the person was found out by proper utilisation of this technology.
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I think it is a Japanese-owned company now but my understanding is that the technology is Israeli. In respect of any State agency, the Garda or the Defence Forces, there is a legislative basis by which there has to be a request to the Ministers and there is a judicial overview of how any surveillance-----
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On behalf of the State, in terms of national security. That is well known. It is documented before the House.
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Yes. It is well known. There is a set procedure. The Deputy knows that, in terms of national security. That is the only area where the State comes in. Obviously, the Garda tries to solve crimes and we have to trust in-----
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-----An Garda Síochána.
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My understanding is the Minister is considering the issue. I will talk to him when he gets back and let the Deputy know.
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Deputy Cullinane raised the issue of the runway and the airport. I dealt with that already. In response to Deputy O'Connor, Jameson is a world-class product. There is enormous investment going on in the Midleton plant and in a new one and obviously there is huge concern about how the tariffs will proceed. Let us remember that the European Union does not want any tariffs. The US Government has started this with a resumption of tariffs on steel and aluminium. The EU has re-enacted what it already had in place the last time but there is a public consultation period. We invite all companies to engage with and input into that. We will be engaging with the Commission. Obviously there has to be a comprehensive response to any tariffs that will be announced on 2 April. The EU will be allowing a bit of time after 2 April before it responds. The EU will adopt a strategic approach, which is what we will push for, that tries to leverage the best outcome possible for the European Union. Be in no doubt that we do not want a tariff war in Europe. It would be damaging to the economy and already we are seeing forecasts of a negative impact on GDP. In response to Deputy Gogarty, I am not too sure it is an election interference event. In terms of Mr. McGregor, as I have articulated publicly, I fundamentally disagree with what he said. In some respects, perhaps, he craves attention-----
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It might be wiser of us not to facilitate that. My understanding is that the humanitarian scheme is not fully closed yet. I do not think the Minister has closed it. I will ask him to engage with Deputy Kerrane and update her in respect of it. In response to Deputy Currie, while the operation of An Garda Síochána is an operational matter. I will raise the issues she has raised here with the Minister. I will ask the Minister for Health to reply to Deputy O'Meara now.
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