EU Budgets
Dail Éireann — 2026-10-01
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Sinéad Gibney (SD), Dublin Rathdown

When I look to small Irish businesses, to our domestic productivity and to our communities on the ground, I do not see the benefits of the competitiveness agenda. No matter what the Minister of State says, his Government absolutely supports and champions that competitiveness agenda. I see redundancies from multinational tech companies and indigenous businesses struggling to survive. I also see a Government working in lockstep with whatever is the prevailing wind at EU level instead of standing up for what is most important to people on the ground here in Ireland. In this MFF, we need to see a focus on the peace project that the EU is supposed to be and can be. We need voices at EU level who will push for that focus on cohesion, democracy and delivering a better quality of life for citizens in the here and now. While we hear lip service and acknowledgement of these things, I do not see or hear anything about this being made a priority. It must be a priority. Those I represent want to know why our taxpayers' money should go towards subsidising arms factories rather than towards improving our society. I want to know what the Minister of State's Department is doing to demand that civil society, civilian life, agricultural life and civil businesses be the focus of the next MFF.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-10-01/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:01:00+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-10-01