On behalf of Independent Ireland and our TDs, I start by saying thanks to every nurse working across Ireland in the hospitals, nursing homes, community care, mental health services and emergency care. I thank every one of them for the tremendous work and their vocation in this State. Without them, we would be in a terrible situation. The irony is not lost on me as we are thanking nurses on this day for what they do for the State that there are nurses in Australia, the United Arab Emirates and Canada who want to come home but cannot. There has been lots of talk on this side of the House about nurses coming home and that we must bring our nurses home, but what would they be coming home to? They are coming home to rents they cannot afford. They are coming home to a property market so difficult to get into that there are no properties there for them to buy. We are spending €100,000 plus every year advertising in Australia and probably €500,000 advertising across the world asking Irish people to come back home, but what have they got to come back home to? That is the worrying thing. I see many people leaving. One Member said earlier that they left by choice and for lifestyle. That may be the situation when people are younger and they want to explore the world and do those things, but most people want to come home. They want to settle down near their families, near their mothers and fathers, they want to be back working in the country they grew up in. They want to give something back to this country. I do not believe that this State is truly interested in bringing back those people who we have educated and done everything right for because it is saying to forget about them. We are not making it viable to come back into this country with the tax brackets. We are not making it viable to come back and buy a property here and we are not making it viable for them to come back by giving them good work conditions. That has to be addressed. While we are all praising nurses in this House today, we must remember that we are letting an awful lot of nurses down across the world who come from and were educated in Ireland. That needs to be addressed.

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