Is it the Government's intention to proceed with the proposed defence (amendment) Bill to provide for the abolition of the triple lock, which is against the expressed wish of the Irish people as expressed in two referendums on the Nice and Lisbon treaties?

Neutrality and a triple lock have served his country well. The current Taoiseach is on record as saying that the triple lock is the core of Irish neutrality. Of course, that neutrality goes back over 100 years to when James Connolly erected a banner on Liberty Hall declaring that, "We serve neither King nor Kaiser, but Ireland". It also goes back to hugely successful protests against conscription in Ireland during the First World War. It goes back to Article 29 of Bunreacht na hÉireann, Éamon de Valera's Constituti…

Irish peacekeepers who have served throughout the world for decades know the value of the triple lock. Neutrality has been an invaluable component of Ireland's foreign policy. This country's involvement in and reputation for peacekeeping gives moral legitimacy to our voice for the international rule of law and peaceful resolution of conflicts. Former Defence Force members with first-hand experience of peacekeeping and conflict have spoken in defence of the triple lock. These people include Senator Tom Clonan who st…

What about the General Assembly?

The General Assembly is entitled to call for peacekeeping missions.

Decent housing is enshrined as a human right in Article 25 of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It should also be enshrined in Bunreacht na hÉireann, the Irish Constitution. A referendum to that effect should be called immediately. The policy of successive Governments has been and continues to be an abysmal failure. Target after target has been missed. There are well over 17,000 families who are now homeless, including well over 5,500 children. Thousands more are living in substandard council houses and…

Local government is the beating heart of democracy. In July of last year, when replying to a question of mine, the Taoiseach confirmed that the abolition of town councils was a big mistake and that he was a great believer in restoring town councils. He said that many town councils had great visionary district councils in the past. In November of last year, the Taoiseach confirmed that it was an issue that was close to his heart, that he opposed the abolition of town and borough councils and that as a democrat, he b…

It is on the record.

The Government has failed rural Ireland. What we have is a lot of talk and not enough delivery. There is a housing crisis, a cost-of-living crisis and a disability crisis in rural Ireland. There are other issues that people in rural Ireland face on a daily basis, such as those relating to a lack of water due to burst water mains, outages, treatment plant malfunctions and boil water notices. Irish Water has contempt for customers. It should never have been established and should be abolished. Tipperary town public w…

I welcome this motion and support it. It is appropriate that we debate this motion on workers' rights in the lead up to May Day. May Day and May Day demonstrations resulted from the adoption of a resolution for a great international demonstration at the International Workers' Congress in Paris in 1889. That demonstration was in support of workers' rights and the demand for an eight-hour working day, and 1 May was chosen to commemorate a general strike in the United States which had begun on 1 May 1886. In Ireland, …

I want to raise again the fact the people of south Tipperary have no consultant ophthalmology service. There has been no eye service for almost two years now. The HSE has failed in its duty to provide that vital service. We have no consultant-led service, no optometry clinics and no nurse-led clinics. As a result there is a huge backlog of 3,000 people, with hundreds of children who have never been seen. There are hundreds of people with glaucoma who either have never been seen or need follow-up and some may be fac…

The programme for Government commits to intensifying the transition to lower cost renewables and electricity generation and to transitioning away from imported fossil fuels. We can see just how expensive fossil fuels can be since the illegal US war on Iran, just how dependent we are on them and how vulnerable that makes us to price shocks. Successive Governments have been too slow to move away from expensive, imported fossil fuels and worse still, are now reversing the existing policy. The Government must expedite …

The Government must stop failing children with additional needs. At the end of 2025, 20,209 children were on the waiting list for assessments of need. The majority have been waiting over two years and almost 95% have been waiting longer than the legal six-month limit under the Disability Act 2005. The Government is breaking the law every hour of every day. The Government threatened the Army on peaceful protesters, but it breaks the law willy-nilly. The waiting lists for therapy are also horrendous. Well over 40,000…

The Tánaiste and Taoiseach have left the Chamber. It is an insult to the Dáil and proof positive that not only will they not listen to the Irish people but they will not listen to TDs in this House. We have a cost-of-living crisis on top of a cost-of-living crisis, and that crisis has been deliberately worsened by Government policy, which favours the rich and powerful in our society and doubles down on the ordinary, decent working people and their families. In the teeth of a cost-of-living crisis, the Government ab…

Did the Government call in the Army to deal with the far-right violent thugs on O'Connell Street in Dublin in 2023?

I have no confidence in the Government.

This is an arrogant Government. It has not listened and is not listening. It has not listened to representative organisations, the public, TDs or Opposition parties. Several motions for a cost-of-living package have been debated in the House. My Private Members' motion in December calling for price controls on electricity, gas, fuel and food was arrogantly voted down. The recent packages are too little and too late. White diesel now costs 36 cent more per litre than it did at the start of the illegal US and Israeli…

-----and he has even attacked the Pope. It is time to stand up to him-----

-----pass the occupied territories Bill and stop-----

-----military planes going through Shannon.