Hear, hear.

I will focus my comments on the recruitment and allocation of SNAs. I recently submitted a parliamentary question on behalf of a local school in my hometown of Drogheda. Despite a clear recommendation from the local SENO to increase its SNA allocation, new posts were denied. That is because of some invisible and arbitrary national cap, an effective recruitment ban that is not a recruitment ban. This is Orwellian stuff, quite frankly. The answer I received from the Minister was certainly long and detailed. It went o…

Trump’s trade tantrum is having a real world impact, just one week after that bizarre event in the White House Rose Garden where an American President held up what looked like a bookmaker’s betting board as he gambled away the world economy in service of his own ego. It is quite bizarre that the country that has done the most to design the current global world economic order is now set on destroying it. The country that has benefited the most from it is upending that very order itself. It would be comical if it was…

Will the Minister provide an update on the Government's plans, as contained in the programme for Government, for updated ethics legislation? He will be well aware that we have been waiting a number of years to see the enactment of legislation that was committed to in the 2020 programme for Government. In fact, it first took draft legislative form in Brendan Howlin's Public Sector Standards Bill in 2015.

I hope the Minister will agree that the standard for this legislation, for want of a better description, was set in the 2015 legislation developed by Brendan Howlin, my then colleague and one of the Minister's predecessors. It has been a considerable number of years since the commitment was made. We have had three Governments since the 2015 legislation was introduced. We have had the review, to which I contributed. I think there were merely ten submissions to that particular process. Whether the Minister likes it o…

There was a commitment in the previous programme for Government. The Deputy spent time as Minister for public expenditure and reform in that-----

The Minister has clarified that. I am happy to accept that. I hope then he will bring some renewed vigour, if I can describe it as such, to this particular process. This is fundamental. Parliamentary democracy is a fragile flower. We have seen across the world how bad actors can exploit situations of corruption or perceived corruption. The consequences of that are happening across the world. It is happening on our screens all the time and is having real impacts in the context of the election of populist right-wing …

I was not expecting to be called so quickly.

I am ill-prepared. I have an amendment to move but I assume it will be taken at a later point.

I move amendment No. 1: In paragraph (1), to delete "31 October 2025" and substitute "31 December 2025". I thank the Minister of State for introducing this measure. We in the Labour Party anticipated last October that we might be in this position at this point in time. The Minister of State was not in her current role then but she may recall that on budget night, when the financial resolution was moved regarding the extension of the VAT reduction for a further period, we proposed that the reduction be maintained at…

That is fair enough. I thank the Ceann Comhairle.

What I said earlier.

Yes. Hear, hear.

Excessive executive control.

Self-serving offices.

It is not the same executive control as here.

You could not wait to do a deal with them as the quickest route to office.

Given the strokes you have pulled, we are glad we did not.

Do not patronise the Labour Party.

The Taoiseach has lost the run of himself. He is making it worse.