If there was ever an example of a do-nothing Government, it is when it comes to dental care. I want to read out a letter from somebody in County Mayo: I’m writing to you as a desperate mother from Mayo. For the past five years, my family has been unable to access any dental care through the medical card in our area. No one is accepting new patients, and despite endless phone calls, pleading, and searching, we’ve hit a brick wall over and over again. My 23-year-old daughter is on a disability payment and has been in…

I appreciate that the Bill before us will provide for revisions to corporate governance arrangements within the HSE. I welcome this. If ever an agency needed governance reforms, it was the HSE. There have been too many incidents of governance failures at this agency. I refer to the CervicalCheck scandal, which revealed 162 women were not informed about missed abnormalities in their smear tests; the 2023 nursing home review, which revealed serious governance lapses after a resident was raped by a staff member in the…

The INMO is telling untruths, then. It is telling untruths, as it says there are not safe staffing levels. You can hold up whatever documents you like, Minister.

The Minister can hold up whatever document she likes, but I am telling her that there are not enough staff in Mayo University Hospital in the emergency department section to provide safe service there. I am also telling the Minister that it is a deterrent for so many people who want to, and probably need to, go to hospital. They want to do everything to stay out of hospital. Those nurses and other staff members are absolutely run off their feet. They are expected to operate on a corridor with trolleys each side of …

I am sorry but the Minister needs to get with the programme.

I welcome the establishment of the commission of investigation, which, unfortunately, is long overdue. The reality is that we will never know how many victims are not alive to see this day. Louise O'Keeffe had to fight tooth and nail to hold the State to account for the abuse she suffered. This Government and its predecessors have known for decades of the horrendous abuse endured by children who should have been in a safe place, yet it is only setting up the commission of investigation now. That said, I do welcome …

Hear, hear.

Hear, hear.

The Minister's response is not good enough. It is as plain and simple as that. She should hear the stories of all the women in the Gallery. I am proud of my party colleagues, particularly Senator McCormack and my party president, Deputy McDonald, for bringing this motion before the House. It would never be brought to the House by the Government. Since the beginning of the Sinn Féin campaign to achieve adequate endometriosis services, I have spoken to many people from Mayo who are suffering with this debilitating co…

I am really glad the Minister of State, Deputy Seán Canney, is here, and the reason for that is the western rail corridor. He has always been committed to it. I commend him on how he worked when in opposition to secure the western rail corridor – first the link from Athenry to Claremorris and then the link from Claremorris to Collooney. Therefore, I do not need to tell him how important it is; he knows. What I want is to get the Claremorris–Athenry line up and running. The Minister of State and I know from conversa…

The fact we are here today discussing amendments so soon after the Government's watershed planning Act of 2024 confirms that it did not get the reforms right first time. Sinn Féin called for additional scrutiny back then and, par for the course, we were not listened to. The issues this Bill seeks to address should have been part of the discussions on the original legislation. Again, we are asking the Government to accept Sinn Féin's amendments to this Bill to strengthen the legislation. I note these technical chang…

I commend the students who gathered outside the gates this evening and the students who are here this evening, including the new student union representatives, for pushing back against this desperate situation. Parents and students need to know how much they will be paying in nine weeks' time. They need to know this now. People have to budget. Members of this Government do not seem to get this but my constituents do. Ger in east Mayo has twin daughters. She says that she cannot choose between her twins, who are bot…

I thank my colleague, Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh, not only for bringing this motion to the House, but for the battle he continuously fights to protect our rebel history and respect our patriot dead and their families. Sinn Féin has set out a clear vision in Aengus's Bill to develop the 1916 cultural quarter in line with the Moore Street Preservation Trust. The GPO and the surrounding lanes and houses of Moore Street are hallowed ground for Irish people. The Government's proposal to sell off this incredible piece of h…

At every turn, this Government chooses to denigrate our history. Why will it not name the new hospital after Kathleen Lynn? It would be a fitting tribute to the Mayo woman who served as the most senior ranking woman in the 1916 Rising, who set up Ireland's first children's hospital and who led efforts to eradicate TB. The Government should choose a fitting name for the national children's hospital and it must protect and develop the GPO and the Moore Street cultural quarter. The Government is not going to get away …

Today marks a full year since the announcement of the appointment of Ms Bríd O'Flaherty as chairperson of the inquiry into the historical licensing and use of sodium valproate in women of child-bearing age. It is almost six years since the then Minister for Health announced the inquiry in November 2020. Why is the inquiry yet to commence? Thousands of women in Ireland were prescribed Epilim despite emerging evidence of its harmful effects during pregnancy. In France, a redress scheme has been established. In Britai…

Six years on; it has to get started.

The recent “RTÉ Investigates” exposé was shocking and shameful and the sheer lack of compassion and respect shown to the residents in that programme was appalling. We can only imagine the pain they and their families suffered, as well as the worry it has caused to others as a result. I commend RTÉ, although it should not be up to RTÉ to expose these atrocities that are going on. My first question to the Minister is this. What protections are in place to prevent companies that have legal cases against them in other …

One hundred and forty-one countries enable their diaspora to vote. People living in my constituency and members of my own family can vote in the presidential elections. It is mind-boggling that Irish citizens in the North and our international diaspora cannot vote in presidential elections. The Minister of State said this will be looked at and that there is so much we agree on. We have to stop commentating on this and put it right. It is plainly wrong that we have not enacted it so far. President Higgins rightly ci…

My first question asks the Minister to provide a list of companies operating in Ireland which are trading with linked companies located in the occupied Palestinian territories. In 2020 the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights published a listing of all businesses involved in the illegal Israeli settlements. It was a highly significant development, naming those in the corporate world complicit with the war crime that is Israel's settlement enterprise. That database was set up in 2023.

As I said, when that UN database was updated in 2023 several companies with offices in Ireland remained on it following the update. It is widely known that these include Airbnb, Booking.com and Tripadvisor. The International Court of Justice ruled in July 2024 that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories is unlawful, that Israel should put an end to the occupation, desist from creating new settlements and evacuate those already established. It further concluded that where Palestinians have lost land and prop…