We are 30 years behind England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. We should be ashamed of ourselves. I heard parents say in the Leinster House complex this morning that they wished their children would die. What kind of a society is that? The Government just does not get it. As one of the mothers said this morning, the Government needs to come out of its bubble. I have been saying this ad nauseam for the last four years. I have to go home now and be a carer with the minimum support from the State, despite its c…

Disabled people are worse off to the tune of-----

Well said.

Hear, hear.

I want to raise in the House again the issue of the triple lock. We have all received the schedule of the Government's legislative programme, which says that the Bill will provide for the removal of the existing requirement regarding the triple lock. Make no mistake, this is in regard to the dispatch of the Defence Forces for service outside the State as part of an international force. What kind of force? If it does not have a UN mandate, if it is not blue helmets, then we are talking about a coalition of the willi…

I propose to share my eight minutes with Senator Keogan. She is going to take one and a half minutes at the end.

This is an inflection point in our political discourse and policy, and we all need to recognise that. I was in the Lower House during the no-confidence debate. It was very heated and people were naturally very passionate in their views, but as a collective we need to pull together because there are voices in front of Leinster House now who are trying to seize the narrative. This is not just about a fuel crisis or cost-of-living crisis; it is a political crisis of how we communicate. Therefore, I want to be as const…

The Defence Forces were inappropriately tasked through the C70, which involves aid to the civil power. This involves the use of force. Obviously, during the Troubles, we had aid-to-the-civil-power operations. I was involved in armed operations in support of An Garda Síochána, but you do not deploy in that manner for a civilian protest. We did not do it during the H-Block protests, the burning down of the British Embassy, the Love Ulster parade or the Dublin riots. Margaret Thatcher did not even deploy the army agai…

I want to discuss the fast-moving geopolitical environment we inhabit at the moment. As we speak, the US is deploying approximately 8,000 ground troops to the Persian Gulf. Included are the 1st Marine expeditionary force and the 82nd airborne division. This presages a ground intervention against a population with 91 million citizens. It is part of a growing strategic doctrine in the US on what is referred to as the “axis of disruption” of CRINK, namely, China, Russia, Iran and North Korea. These countries have now …

I want to raise the case of Chloe Maher, a 23-year-old young woman from Coolock in Dublin who died at the weekend. This is a young woman who had no intervention for her scoliotic curve on her spine. She had a preoperative intervention about three years ago, and then nothing. Now she has passed away for lack of a timely intervention. This is the second young adult or child who has died in these circumstances in recent months. Yesterday, I went to the Tullamore Court Hotel and met a mother, Angela Briggs, who is terr…

Is the Minister of State taking this Commencement matter?

I want to raise in the House and with the Minister of State a matter concerning a letter that was recently sent to an older lady in HSE south west who simply could not deal with her adult daughter's disability. She is caring for this adult child on her own. In crisis, she brought her daughter to the local emergency department in a desperate cry for help. Can you imagine, as a parent - as I am and as the Minister of State is - leaving a disabled child at the emergency department? The response from the HSE was a lett…

This is a simple Commencement matter, to ask if the Minister will make a statement confirming that disabled adults have a right to State-funded supports. Do they have that right? I ask the Minister of State, in her final response to me, to give me a yes or no. Do they have a right? In the statement that she read out, which was presumably prepared by a public servant, they say that we will "make every effort to provide the correct supports". That is the same wording as the discredited constitutional amendment refere…

I want to raise in the House today some of the questions that the Taoiseach brought up in his meeting in the White House yesterday with President Trump. First, I congratulate the Taoiseach because that was a very difficult environment to be in and he acquitted himself well, given the circumstances. The Taoiseach has rightly raised questions, as has the Tánaiste, about the legitimacy of the current air campaign on Iran. It is a humanitarian catastrophe and an environmental catastrophe and as much as we despise the r…

It is highly appropriate on International Women's Day that a man gets up at the end to mansplain everything to everybody. I was struck by Senator Comyn's comment about International Men's Day. In many respects, every day is International Men's Day because of the structural inequalities and the obstacles to women and girls all over the world. At the moment in the world, things are at a very difficult point for women and girls, whether it is Islamic fundamentalism, the Taliban, fundamental Christianity in parts of th…

Senator Conway and I propose to share time.

I will try to stick to the time. The clock is ticking. The Minister is very welcome. I am speaking on SNA numbers. Sna hochtóidí, bhí mé i mo mhúinteoir bunscoile ar feadh dhá bhliain. Rinne mé céim oideachais i gColáiste na Tríonóide trí mheán na Gaeilge. Táim as cleachtadh le go leor bliain anuas. Déanaim tréaniarracht mo thuairimí a leagan amach go soiléir i mBéarla na banríona. My concern is not just as a former primary school teacher who taught in a school in Lucan, but also as a parent of a child with additio…

I do not mourn the passing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He was a man who slaughtered tens of thousands of his countrymen and hung beautiful young men and women. I think of my 21-year-old daughter and the thought of her being hung by the neck for revealing her hair. It is a disgusting regime. I do not mourn his passing. What I do mourn, however, is the passing of the international rules-based order. That is something that impacts everybody in this room, our children and our grandchildren. Trump, in case anybody has fa…

Fine Gael's MEPs published a document on this a number of years ago. It is there in black and white.

Senator Ahearn interrupted me.