I want to raise the issue of a victim's rights when the perpetrator of a crime is leaving prison or other institution. Prior to being a TD I was not aware of the very significant rights that exist under the victim's charter, including the right to know where a person is imprisoned, changes to his or her custody or location, and so on. That applies to those in prison but also to those people who are in the forensic mental health services. Difficult cases are described thus for a reason. A constituent of mine, Ms Fio…

I appreciate that matters before the court are often in the control of the Judiciary. There is a clear separation of powers between what happens in this House and what happens and how decisions are made in a court. As Ms Bourke sat across from me at my clinic, and she was there for some time, I could only agree with her. She feels that a crime was committed and that while justice was administered and there was a process for dealing with all of that, the ultimate outcome of the sanction of a custodial sentence was n…

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the statements following the meeting of the European Council in December. I thank the Taoiseach for outlining some of the matters that were discussed. Ukraine, the Middle East and EU enlargement were referenced. It is only a matter weeks since the European Council meeting and yet the entire world has changed in those few weeks. I might touch on some of the international developments, but the issue in Greenland is one we have to approach with great consideration here in Ireland.…

It is not often in this House you feel like you are making any progress at all, but I wish to congratulate the Minister of State on bringing forward this Bill. I know it is something which she and many of us in Fianna Fáil have been working on for some time. I should probably also note the support of the former Minister, Stephen Donnelly, when he was in the House. In August 2023, a number of people in the local Tidy Towns group in my area contacted me reporting the proliferation of these disposable or single-use va…

As the Minister of State will know, the better energy warmer homes scheme is an incredibly popular scheme. Now that the Government has expanded eligibility to fuel supplement recipients more and more people are availing of it. The Taoiseach said that 26% of homes are eligible for the fuel supplement. The changes earlier in the year to the European Commission's rulings on state funding of replacement of fossil fuel devices is having an impact on the better energy warmer homes scheme. It is time for the scheme to be …

I appreciate the response. The most important point the Minister of State made is that this is a fully funded scheme. Unlike the other grant schemes available to local authorities under which the responsibility falls on the individual owner to decide how they will replace their boiler, this is a fully funded scheme and it is up to the SEAI to provide the solution. There is difficulty, however, for a number of people I have been dealing with who previously would have been eligible for the full scheme with the wrapar…

The Minister of State is right that this scheme has transformed the scheme but because of that decision not to replace a gas boiler, a very expensive heat pump system is being put in place. That is fantastic for those who avail of this but that transforms the scheme itself and the cost of the scheme. It will mean that fewer people will have access to the scheme if those resources are used. There is a question to be asked: where the boiler is not replaced by SEAI, why they cannot just put in the insulation and leave…

I appreciate that.

In my constituency between Shanowen Road and Collins Avenue there are proposals to build new apartment developments. While the additional new housing is incredibly welcome, unfortunately the under-utilised industrial estate there is currently occupied by Santry Boxing Club. Would the Taoiseach agree as well as powering ahead with the provision of new housing, Dublin City Council needs to have a more proactive strategy of making land available to sports clubs so they can avail of programmes like the sports capital g…

I welcome the support the Minister of State and his Department have given in opening new ASD classes in my own constituency over the last number of years. I also welcome the recent visit he made to St. Michael's House Special National School when it was opening its new building on a great day for that community. I wish to ask the Minister of State about the Finglas Parochial National School and the provision of ASD classes at its location.

I thank the Minister of State. We welcomed the sanction of special classes in the Finglas national school. It is an incredibly historic school and one of the original model schools. The difficulty is that, in the meantime, there is a temporary provision in a local community hall where, only on a part-time basis, education is being provided. The difficulty with that is that many parents moved their children from full-time places either in other schools where they were not in an ASD class or from a preschool where th…

I thank the Minister of State, and particularly his office, which I have been in touch with many times on this issue. We do not control the planning process and it was unexpected that the additional information would be required. The difficulty is that parents like Marie, Leanne and others who have been in touch with me were effectively offered half a place. They were told they had to take it and they were not sure they would have it again. The building was not in place and even the solution was not there for a ful…

No it is not Would the Deputy stop?

He is asking in advance.

I wish to raise with the Tánaiste the issue of BusConnects. This morning the National Transport Authority, NTA, and Dublin Bus met with elected representatives in my area and they accepted that the roll out of the F spine has been incredibly poor. They have committed to putting in a new timetable, which would reflect congestion, and to having additional drivers in place compared to the number at the beginning. Would the Tánaiste agree that we have to get better at implementing these BusConnects programmes to instil…

Hear, hear.

Why are you giving out about it? You are giving out about your own suggestion.

An Post is one of our core public services, one that has many fantastic people working within it. Over the past two weeks, I have had the opportunity to engage with two groups of people who have concerns about our post service. The first group relates to post delivery. The Grove Park and Glasnevin areas of my constituency have had significant disruption to their post services as a result of issues around recruitment, rosters and so on. As the Tánaiste knows, people rely on their post services. I have had examples o…

I welcome the debate on this issue as I have on many other occasions and acknowledge Deputy Sherlock for bringing the motion forward. I also acknowledge how appreciative I am of participating in the debate. I remind my Opposition colleagues that they fought tooth and nail to exclude Government backbenchers from participating in Private Members' Bills being brought forward by the Opposition but on the day that is in it, let us be collegiate. The reason I say that is it is important that people from different perspec…

That is the policy we tried in 1977. I urge us to continue to work on this issue because there is a lot of cross-party work on it. I acknowledge former Deputy, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, who worked on it as well.