It is going to put rents up.

This legislation seeks to rewrite the rental rules for the seventh time in a decade. In his speech, the Minister spoke about moderating price growth. Bar the tacit acknowledgement in his speech that rents are too high, there is nothing in the Bill that will bring rents down. I looked on daft.ie recently and I found that within a kilometre of Leinster House, it is €695 a week for a studio apartment on Hatch Street, €4,500 a month on Tara Street, and for a two-bedroom apartment on Grand Canal Place, it is €3,600 a mo…

I thank the Deputy.

I thank the Deputy. He is way over time.

I thank the Deputy.

I thank the Deputy.

This legislation is going to dramatically increase rents. The fact of the matter is that we have an inbuilt deficit of well over 200,000 homes. The Minister is talking about incentivising private sector investment but he is not going to be able to incentivise enough investment within the lifetime of this Oireachtas to bring rents down. Rents need to come down. Students, in particular, are going to be punished by this as they are forced to take up a new lease every year. The average length of a tenancy in this count…

The Minister talks about the Opposition not coming forward with solutions. I have been in this House over a year now. Time and again, we have come forward with amendments to legislation. The Government brings the Bill in, takes Committee and Remaining Stages very quickly in the House and guillotines it. We do not even have time with certain legislation to discuss the substantive amendments. I want to ask the Minister a very specific question on the proposed legislation. Notwithstanding his views on a rent freeze, w…

Hear, hear.

I want to raise the issue of childcare. Yesterday, we heard that 40,000 children are on waiting lists and that over 1,000 childcare facilities have closed over the past six years. I am raising, in particular, the issue of the numerous parents in my own constituency who have contacted me because they are terrified that their crèche, UniKids Childcare, in the National Technology Park, Castletroy, will likely have to close due to core funding issues. The launch of the Government plan to provide State-led early learnin…

Hear, hear.

I will start with what I welcome in the Bill, namely, as Deputy Kelly just noted, the disregard for people convicted of same-sex activity pre 1993. It is really important that we get this done and get it done quickly because those people are getting older. I commend the work done by my colleague Deputy Nash, who was heavily involved in organising, first, the apology, which was the start of a suite of measures to right a terrible historical wrong. The measures in the Bill to disregard those convictions are incredibl…

Deputy Healy-Rae must be working remotely.

Tá díomá orm nach bhfuil an Rialtas ag tabhairt tacaíochta don rún seo agus go bhfuil frithrún curtha isteach ag an Rialtas agus ag an Aire. I am disappointed for a number of reasons. I am disappointed because the amendment as it was presented to us makes no reference to what we have said about remote and flexible work. The Minister of State referenced it in her speech but the amendment to the motion does not reference that. We are lucky in one sense that we have the Minister of State with responsibility for AI wit…

I thank the Minister for his speech. To try to be somewhat constructive, we had good news from the Government this week with the €250 million announcement in my constituency into water treatment in Bunlicky near Mungret, County Limerick. That is important because once the work is done the capacity of that plant will be able to serve 285,000 people. This is more than double what it can do at the moment. This is vital because the population of Limerick is going to go up by 50% under the targets that are there. As a c…

I wish to advise the House of the following matters in respect of which notice has been given under Standing Order 39 and the name of the Member in each case: Deputy Fionntán Ó Súilleabháin - To discuss the crisis of mental health and lack of services in Wexford. Deputy Michael Murphy - To discuss eligibility for the vacant property refurbishment grant. Deputy Paul McAuliffe - To discuss the existing rights of victims of crime following the release of a perpetrator from prison or an institution. Deputy Albert Dolan…

Before I call the Minister, I caution that, notwithstanding the sensitivities of the case, we should avoid naming people who are not in the House. I call the Minister.

For a number of weeks, it was not possible to log on to the X app without being confronted by extremely disturbing sexualised imagery. Grok has created thousands of these images with a significant number being child sexual abuse imagery. This is not an online phenomenon. Online abuse is a gateway to offline abuse and exploitation. X's European headquarters are less than a kilometre from this Chamber and the fact that company benefits from our favourable taxation arrangements for tech companies means the State has s…

Will the Taoiseach commit to come back as soon as possible on what he said about convening a Cabinet meeting?

It is very strange that the majority of us here seem to be from Carlow and Kilkenny. The Labour Party and I welcome the general thrust of what the Minister of State is trying to do with this Bill. I stand here as someone who has struggled an awful lot with nicotine addiction. It is something that personally I have found very hard to overcome for a number of years. I have been on again and off again. I have been smoking cigarettes and have been off cigarettes, I have been smoking cigarettes and I have been off cigar…