Cathy Bennett
Cavan-Monaghan · Sinn Féin · Ireland
“It is important that we are having this discussion but that we will have many more discussions that must be had if we want to achieve a united Ireland in a planned and structured way.”
“I welcome this debate on the financial implications of a united Ireland. I acknowledge that the Tánaiste and so many other Members in this House see its merits in the future. I would have hoped that in this House we would at least have moved past the time of framing this without casting a value judgment.”
“As a person from a Border county, the North should never have been treated any differently from Cork, Kerry or Dublin. Irish unity is an opportunity to move beyond very real consequences that were inflicted upon the North, by a dysfunctional British State, and one that is totally disinterested in the needs of our people.”
“Most recently, we had a situation whereby the Government's refusal to adequately fund our schools led to cuts being imposed on every Government Department. If the Government wishes to work towards truly free education and to avoid being the cause of stress and financial hardship in the year ahead, there are a few things it should do.”
“The idea that education in Ireland is free at any level is a myth, whether it is the so-called voluntary contributions or a student contribution fee that costs more even though the Government claims it is reduced. It is utterly galling for hard-pressed families who shell out hundreds or even thousands of euro a year.”
“I welcome that we have recently seen progress on a number of important measures relating to domestic abuse, but what is of crucial importance is that we get the legislation and policy right.”
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“In the face of an ongoing cost-of-living crisis and a student accommodation crisis that has seen more students and families forced to pay upwards of €14,000 for a single year's accommodation, and despite having contested the general election on a platform of reducing college fees, the first action the Government took was to announce an increase of college fees of €1,000 per year. Now, the Government is flying the kite that it may only put up the fees by €500, no doubt expecting plaudits on budget day from those whom the Government is only screwing over by half as much as it had originally planned. Sinn Féin has called for fees to be scrapped. Will the Minister meet this commitment? Will the Fine Gael-Fianna Fáil Government do this or is helping students something it only talks about during elections?”
“Instead of investing this money through the NTMA in things like green energy, which the State and wider society and communities could benefit from, private industry has to get its cut. Perhaps it is the Government’s plan that Irish workers can benefit from institutional investment making a fortune on the back of the housing crisis. Of course, that benefit will accrue should the housing crisis continue to be unaddressed, which is a near-certainty under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Auto-enrolment is a good idea. The compulsory removal from ordinary workers’ pockets today is not. Allowing Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to gift these funds to the private pension industry rather than investing them for the good of workers and the benefit of Irish citizens as a whole utterly exposes where those parties’ priorities lie.”
“While Sinn Féin supports an auto-enrolment pension scheme it is disappointing, though not surprising, that whether through intent, incompetence or through the efforts of the Minister’s predecessor this pension scheme does not prioritise workers’ financial well-being either today or in retirement. In the midst of a cost-of-living crisis workers will see their take-home pay go down and while the Government will allow them to opt out, it is bizarrely delaying their right to do so by six months. At the same time workers continue to face a cost-of-living crisis that has not abated. There are spiralling rents, increased college fees and Government supports like the energy credit have been withdrawn. Now the Government is going to reach into workers’ pockets and reduce their take-home pay.”
“Sinn Féin supports an auto-enrolment pension scheme. We believe it is the Government's responsibility to foster a retirement framework that ensures workers are financially secure in their retirement. However, both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have a poor track record on retirement policy. While Sinn Féin believes workers should have the right to retire at 65 should they choose to, or continue to work if that is not their choice, the two Government parties would deny workers that right. Even after decades of backbreaking physical labour, those parties are comfortable with asking for more work out of workers who want to retire.”
“For example, workers will lose wages on the day of the presidential election because no children are going to school. Truthfully, there seems to be an issue within the Department of contracting workers on poorer terms than might be expected. The Department fosters financial uncertainty among workers. Parents do not want compensation to make alternative arrangements. They want their Government and Ministers to do their jobs to ensure that every child is allocated a school seat on the bus. Please get your act together as soon as possible, and definitely before next year or we will go through this chaos again.”
“A key recommendation of that report was that from September of this year, the nearest school criteria would be reduced, but that has not happened yet. We have seen a handful of pilot studies with no meaningful change. As a result, children across this State have been denied places on their local school bus. This is a mess of the Minister's making. She has implemented a review and her response to the shambles that she is overseeing amounts to an excuse that contracts were cancelled at the last minute and a sop of throwing money at parents, by the way of an apology, to make alternative arrangements. Why was such a volume of contracts cancelled at the last minute? Why is the Minister signing contracts to facilitate chaos? One potential reason that I have been informed of is that workers on these routes do not have good working conditions.”
“I disagree with Deputy Byrne. As far as I can see, school transport is getting worse every year. Every year I am contacted by parents whose children have been utterly failed by this Government. With little to no notice parents are left to shoulder the burden of attempting to reschedule work and other commitments to deal with the Government's failures while children see buses full of their schoolmates and classmates passing by their homes with no space for them. However, there are spaces. Tickets have been allocated to children who do not use the bus, so the spaces lie idle and other children who need the bus cannot avail of them. Families have endured three years of utter chaos while the Department has conducted a review into the school transport scheme, which was eventually published 19 months ago.”
“We need a permanent school and I have been told that a letter as sent to the Department offering the ground for a permanent school and the Minister of State has not acted on it. The time for a crisis-driven approach to special education must come to an end. Sinn Féin's motion outlines what this Government needs to do and these are the measures that every TD should support.”
“It is a failure to plan, a failure to invest and a failure to deliver adequate school infrastructure and supports over successive Governments. It is either a failure of priority or basic competency. In my constituency of Cavan-Monaghan where we have secured an additional 18 spaces for special education in Castleblayney, it is not nearly enough, as the Minister of State said earlier. This school is not open yet. He said that at the start of October he is going to start to plan for the future. What happened all the years that he has been in government that he did not plan? The school in Castleblayney was only a stopgap, with 18 places for all the children in County Monaghan who have special needs. What we need in County Monaghan is a permanent special school, not a school with just 18 places.”
“I welcome the parents in the Gallery. These parents suffer every day because this Government is not doing its job. Every child deserves a place in school and every child with additional needs deserves a place in school. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have failed, and continue to fail, children. It is the ordinary families like the parents here tonight who break their necks and are left simply to cope on their own, to pay for every intervention their children need. An estimated 260 children were without an offer of an appropriate place at the start the summer but we know that the scale of this is far greater, with campaign groups identifying a further 168 children. Others who have been offered a place face uncertainty due to delays in building works and also with no transport. This is a failure.”
“I am utterly convinced of the need to restore services to Monaghan hospital that were stripped away by previous Governments but the Minister can make a change. My appeal to her is straightforward. Will the Minister agree to review the current operational framework of emergency care in Cavan and Monaghan, particularly the need for CT and MRI scanners in Monaghan hospital?”
“Past Ministers and the HSE have utterly refused to even examine the situation. If we ask about additional equipment in Monaghan, for example, a CT scanner or MRI scanner, currently exclusively located in Cavan hospital, we are told there is not a need because people can access them in Cavan hospital, but despite this, hundreds of people are on waiting lists, and waiting times in Cavan hospital are unacceptable. I ask the Minister again for a feasibility study and for this to happen in Cavan and Monaghan hospital so that we have the correct equipment in those hospitals. Can the Minister appreciate how frustrating it is for the people of Monaghan that they have to travel to Cavan and Drogheda to be seen and not have such long waiting lists? Why are we being treated by this?”
“A person can wait over 24 hours in Cavan emergency department without the necessary services. This is just not good enough. This hospital in Cavan is servicing three counties. I can give the Minister an example. A person from Monaghan with an injury - for example, a suspected broken bone - may find themselves in the minor injuries unit in Monaghan hospital and will be asked to go to Cavan hospital emergency department. God knows how long people will have to wait there. I have waited there for 24 hours with my mother. After that wait, because you have a suspected broken bone, you will be asked to travel to Drogheda to wait again. The Minister might find it hard to believe this, but this is what the people of Cavan and Monaghan are dealing with. What is the Minister going to do about it?”
“The Taoiseach, not content to be unable to admit that he and his Government have made mistakes in the past, has in recent weeks sought to rewrite history to cover up for his failure to protect services in Cavan and Monaghan while he was in government. The facts are plain to see. The health boards had been abolished by the time Monaghan emergency department closed. The HSE was in place when accident and emergency services were stripped from our hospital in Monaghan under a Fianna Fáil Government. If the Taoiseach would like to backdate the decision to his own tenure as Minister for Health, he is free to do so, but the situation today is the Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill's responsibility. The minor injuries unit in Monaghan hospital does incredible work but this is not enough. We need an emergency department.”
“Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil introducing legislation to provide for revised governance and accountability for the HSE is farcical. In effect, the most substantive aspect of governance I see is a chief executive whose grossly substantial salary facilitates their operating as a mudguard for the Minister of the day. Regarding accountability, with scandal after scandal in our health service, the one certainty is always that no one will be held to account and that there will be no transparency. This should not come as a surprise to anybody, because it is part of a culture that is not limited to the HSE. It pervades every inch of Government itself.”
“What have Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael done that they have overseen the collapse in the school screening programme? At the same time, they have fostered an environment that has seen the number of dentists participating in the scheme to provide care to medical card holders decrease by 50% in just eight years, despite warnings from across this House. In County Monaghan, for example, as of May 2024, nearly 40% of whole-time-equivalent hours for dentistry positions were vacant. Last month, the one consultant orthodontist post in the region was also vacant, as were both specialist orthodontist posts. This is utterly scandalous and stands as another testament to the failure of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael in terms of dental services in counties like Monaghan. When will the promised dental services plan be brought forward to address the situation?”
“I thank the Independent and Parties Technical Group for bringing forward this motion on this very important matter. This Government is utterly failing in terms of dental services. The Minister's role is to provide a framework in which services can reliably and efficiently be delivered and to adequately fund these services. As I see it, the Minister is utterly failing. Of the 200,000 schoolchildren eligible for dental screening appointments, only half received what they were entitled to. Blaming the pandemic might have flown in its aftermath, but at some point the Minister must accept that her job is to address this backlog and not to make excuses for it. Despite the increase in population, the Irish Dental Association tells us we have 23% fewer public dentists than we had 15 years ago.”
“We want to see gold standard surgical management for this agonising condition. Unfortunately, the Government's amendment tonight represents anything but that. I am disgusted by it. With regard to women who choose to avail of private treatment abroad, women travel abroad for healthcare for chronic conditions but they do not travel abroad to enjoy it as a trip. They do it literally for the good of their health because they have been failed by the Minister's health service. I call on all Deputies to support the Sinn Féin motion. The Minister should withdraw the callous and uncaring amendment and listen to the stories of many women who are suffering immediately.”
“Women have been dismissed, not believed and told to go to invisible endometriosis hubs. Women who have been told to do this have travelled to England. Why would they do that if the treatment were here in this country? What has been apparent at Sinn Féin’s public meetings is that endometriosis does not simply impact on women. It impacts on families, quality of life, intimacy and planning for and having children. It impacts on people’s ability to get an education and to work, with 95% of respondents to a Sinn Féin survey indicating they had missed such commitments. Sinn Féin recognises these impacts on women, families and our society. That is why our motion calls for a dedicated, multidisciplinary endometriosis treatment centre to be staffed and resourced to provide diagnostic and holistic management and specialised excision surgery.”
“I welcome all the ladies in the Gallery who have suffered long enough. I thank Senator Maria McCormack who has travelled the length and breadth of the country to be informed of endometriosis. I have said in the House before that this State has a sad history of failing women. The Government continues to fail women today when it comes to the diagnosis and care for those with endometriosis. It is accepted by clinical specialists that the true prevalence of this condition goes beyond the official figure of one in ten women. The failures to diagnose and believe women when they say they are in pain, and the failure of a Minister to act, have led to nine-year delays in women being able to access adequate treatment. Sinn Féin has hosted nine meetings across the State. The stories told by women were harrowing.”
“There were 12 new units in 2023 and fewer than 50 additional units are set to be delivered this year. This is all in the context of the target falling far off the number of spaces mandated by the convention on domestic violence. People in Cavan and Monaghan are entitled to a refuge, as is anyone else in this State, including those in the other seven counties that also continue to lack these services. I appeal to the Minister to recognise that. I urge him to give a commitment to our communities that he will right the wrongs of past governments and deliver adequate refuge for the women and children of counties Cavan and Monaghan.”
“I have heard it is looking for somewhere to progress this to and it still has not happened, so I ask the Minister to help with this. Is it his ambition to progress this and increase spaces? It would show real leadership. Will he pledge to provide adequate spaces in every county? We need a greater level of services across the board. We need legislative proposals to be progressed and enacted. The Minister will agree with this, but surely he will accept the bare minimum we owe women and children who have to flee their homes is a refuge, regardless of where they live. Is it the Minister's ambition? He will determine whether this will happen or not. Unfortunately the progress since the Government announced the target of doubling the number of spaces to 280 has been lacking.”
“I would like to acknowledge that the Minister is currently progressing legislative proposals on the guardianship rights of those who have murdered their spouse as well as the disclosure of counselling notes. It is important that we get the proposals right and it is welcome that they are progressing through the Oireachtas. I am delighted to hear that the Minister is visiting refuges, but an area that remains of particular concern to me, because it impacts my constituency of Cavan-Monaghan, is that of refuge spaces in the constituency. Cavan and Monaghan continue to be among the nine counties which lack a domestic violence refuge. While I welcome the commitment of the Government to establishing a refuge in Cavan or Monaghan, this must be done immediately.”
“I will call it what it is: both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have played politics with the occupied territories Bill. Ursula von der Leyen's credibility on human rights and international humanitarian law is long gone and buried beneath the rubble and ash of Gaza. In choosing whether to include services in the occupied territories Bill, and in picking and choosing when the Government complies with international law, the Tánaiste and the Minister of State should be aware that their credibility is also on the line.”
“In the face of a European Commission bereft of credibility or basic morality, it has become incumbent on the Government to act, to take meaningful action and to sanction Israel for its inhumane crimes. The Government has failed in that regard, nowhere more so than in the terms of the occupied territories Bill. The Tánaiste announced on the eve of the election that Fine Gael would support the Bill and not a watered-down version that excludes services. The Taoiseach and the then Minister for Foreign Affairs had officials cosponsor a UN General Assembly resolution last year, alongside Palestine, on the implementation of the ICJ decision on the consequences of Israel's illegal occupation. This was a resolution that made no distinction between goods and services.”
“It was von der Leyen's Commission that threw red tape and bureaucracy in the way of funds to organisations that work to alleviate the suffering of the people of Gaza on the basis of a baseless Israeli slander. It was von der Leyen's Commission that has taken virtually no meaningful action or sanction against Israel intended to pressure it or to bring an end to the genocide there. It was von der Leyen's Commission that ignored the request from the Irish Government in February of last year to examine Israel's war crimes. Despite this, we know that a leaked internal EU report from the Commission has found that Israel has committed war crimes. Von der Leyen's response has been little to naught. Despite a more substantive review last month, she now sits on her hands for a further month.”
“The Taoiseach correctly described the failure of the European Union to come to a unified position on Gaza as a huge strain on the bloc. He also said that if it fails to do so, Europe will have no credibility. European Union Commissioner, President Ursula von der Leyen, today lacks any credibility on human rights or international humanitarian law. It was Ursula von der Leyen who, at the onset of Israel's onslaught against the civilian population of Gaza, through offering Benjamin Netanyahu unconditional and unqualified support, provided the political cover for the barbarity of the genocidal regime that has unfolded in front of our eyes.”
“While the Government refuses to bring clarity for students, the most substantive intervention it could muster was an utterly bizarre intervention from the Minister for further and higher education, who accused Sinn Féin of introducing uncertainty and called on the Opposition for clarity. Let me be very clear. Sinn Féin's proposal is to reduce fees by €1,500 as a first step to their full abolishment. Will the Minister please clarify if the Government will charge students more this year than the last year? Will it be €2,000 or €3,000? Can I please have an answer to this very simple question tonight?”
“The Minister for further and higher education, the Minister for public expenditure, the Minister for finance, the Tánaiste and the Taoiseach refuse to clarify whether the bill due in a matter of weeks will be €2,000 or €3,000. It is a simple answer. Students and their families should not be victim to the internal manoeuvres of the disingenuous attempts by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to portray themselves as Opposition parties while they are in government, playing the deflection game as usual. It is apparent the well-being of students, financially and otherwise, is the furthest thing from the Government's mind.”
“I welcome the students here tonight. We in Sinn Féin appreciate their efforts to go to college and better themselves. In a matter of weeks, students will be returning to their studies or setting off to college for the first time. What should be a time of excitement for so many will turn into a very stressful situation as they face the challenge of funding for so-called free education being impacted. Not content in recent weeks with weakening protections for student renters and driving their rents up further, the Government is now effectively toying with students by increasing the cost of their education by an additional €1,000. Is this bluster?”
“At the root of this is the Government's refusal to take a rights-based approached to healthcare." The crux of the matter is, indeed, the failure to take a rights-based approach to healthcare, namely, the right to dignified, adequate care for all people in their later years. HIQA will have to account for itself but Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil must account for their absolute failure in this area, which has ensured the shameful scandals of the past continue, shamefully, to thrive in Ireland today.”
“Deputy Martin was the epitome of this affliction. He always had to have another report from another commission. The current Minister is acting in the same way on this important matter. Micheál Martin is back in office, this time joined by Fine Gael, and it seems the affliction described now equally affects Ministers of both hues. My predecessor as Sinn Féin TD for Cavan-Monaghan, Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin, had the measure of the Government of the day when he remarked: "The Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats partnership has had nearly a decade to get health policy right and it has failed miserably.”
“The State has a long, sorrowful and shameful history of failing those within its care. Women, especially mothers, and children have endured the brunt of that long, sorry history. Whether we are talking about survivors of institutional abuse or the degradation of babies' organs; those responsible for delivering justice not only failed to deliver it but actively sought to deny justice. What invariably follows exercises in the pursuit of justice are attempts to delay and defer. Actions taken are rarely done in an accountable way and never in a timely manner. This is not the first scandal involving nursing homes. Twenty years ago, the Leas Cross scandal led to the establishment of HIQA. At that time, a Fine Gael TD remarked: There is a growing sense that "Michéalitis" is continuing in the Department of Health and Children.”
“The people of Monaghan and Cavan deserve adequate health services and care within their community. In 2002, the Taoiseach, as Minister for Health and Children, refused to give a commitment to protect emergency department services at Monaghan hospital at that crucial time. In 2009, the hospital's emergency department was closed for good. The minor injuries unit lacks basic equipment. As a result, people in Monaghan are referred to Cavan hospital, where they face double the waiting time they previously faced, which can be eight hours up to 24 hours. Does the Taoiseach accept he was wrong to strip emergency department services from Monaghan hospital? Will he deliver the investment that is needed to address this failure and stop the backlogs that are happening in Cavan hospital?”
“If the Minister of State can address the questions I have put to him and learn from the approach taken by an Teachta Ó Snodaigh in terms of speaking to the people that the legislation and policy will impact, then this Bill will be a net positive. It is up to the Minister of State now. I urge him to rise to the occasion.”
“In that context, I commend my party colleague and spokesperson on arts and culture Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh on bringing forward the Taxes Consolidation (Rights of Performers and Film Workers) (Amendment) Bill 2025, which would ensure equal treatment for Irish performers compared with their international counterparts and ban the use of buy-out contracts that deny performers ongoing revenue for their work. I also commend an Teachta Ó Snodaigh on his culture and arts policy, not only for being a comprehensive vision for the arts and culture but also for the manner in which he went about developing it. He had meaningful engagement with stakeholders and those it would impact.”
“However, in advance of Committee Stage, I encourage the Minister of State to reflect on the issues highlighted and engage with the representative bodies of those impacted and hear their concerns in full with a view to amending the legislation. I would like the Minister of State to address the concerns I am raising. What discussion has he had with the Minister for Justice, Home Affairs and Migration in relation to this Bill? Will he outline in full the engagement and consultation he has undertaken with the representative bodies and those in the sector? What is the justification for disputes involving music and sound recordings being treated differently from any other type of intellectual property? Sinn Féin wants to see stronger protection and fairer compensation for artists.”
“In this instance, the Government will contribute to the logjam that exists within the courts and possibly negatively impact access to justice due to likely increases in the cost of progressing and resolving a dispute. I do not see why the Government would take such an approach. The Minister of State has not adequately explained or justified that approach, especially in light of the controller's office continuing to handle all intellectual property cases other than music and sound recordings and, most importantly, in light of the lack of engagement with those performers on whom the Bill will impact. Sinn Féin will support this Bill proceeding to Committee Stage in recognition of the need for legislation in this area and in light of the approach taken in some of its provisions.”
“I welcome that the Government is introducing legislation to address issues relating to the incorrect transposition of the EU copyright directive identified by the High Court and the CJEU. Legislation is necessary. We understand that. A more equitable distribution of royalties is absolutely welcome, but the Bill the Government has brought before the House is poorly thought out, regressive and ill-conceived in terms of the mechanism available to artists to vindicate their right to resolve disputes. The Government is shoehorning into this legislation a change of venue from the Controller of the Intellectual Property Office to the Circuit Court. I cannot see the sense in this. It is at odds with the general policy direction of the Government regarding the courts, whereby alternative dispute resolution mechanisms are encouraged.”
“Does the Minister honestly believe that how he has handled legislation will instil confidence? Sinn Féin is the party of confidence. We believe in having certainty in policy for the market and for homeowners and renters alike. We want to ban rent increases, ban no-fault evictions, support the reduction of the cost of rent, provide funding to bring vacant council houses back into use, adequately fund the tenant in situ scheme and mandate that interest rate reductions are passed onto homeowners. The only certainty that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are capable of bringing to the housing crisis is that they screw it up again and again. They should be deeply ashamed of their proposals today, which will, rather than cut rents, expose renters to increased rents, increased evictions and increased homelessness.”
“He should have done it in a way that would not have put jobs at risk but he did not. The manner in which he did it is an illustration of the gross incompetence that is actually maladministration. The legislation the Minister has brought before the House today is woeful. He forgot about the students in the midst of a student housing crisis. Selling the spiel that he will cut rents is an untruth. Was the Minister for further and higher education not present when this was brought to Cabinet? Has the Government forgotten about the student housing crisis? This is the reason we have a legislative process; it is for Bills to be adequately and appropriately scrutinised. However, the Government has no need for legislative conventions and norms. It wants certainty for institutional investors and that is its goal.”
“This is the theme throughout Government and nowhere more so than in housing policy. The Government has an ideological opposition to building public homes on public land, especially if they are to be built by the State. We know this. The public-private partnership scheme was a farce. Effectively the Government rediscovered the concept of council housing but had to make space in it for its investor friends to wet their beaks. It is right the Minister has pulled the plug on it but the manner in which he has done so, putting houses, jobs and taxpayers' money at risk, has been, again, a farce. It is gross incompetence. The Minister should have done this months ago and not left a building contractor with a significant liability. He should have done it months ago and not potentially exposed the State to a significant liability.”
“I am simply aghast to see how the Government conducts its business with arrogance and incompetence. I recall some months ago there being a discussion on the role of inconsistent policy in driving investment away. In his press release last week, the Minister said this legislation is intended to introduce certainty. It is railroaded legislation in which we have already seen holes. It is poor legislation that will introduce a convoluted four-tiered rent pressure regime. It is unclear legislation, the detail of which has shifted across what has been at least four different contradictory and confusing announcements. This is the Minister's attempt to introduce certainty. It is galling that with a straight face he has the arrogance to stand over this poorly-thought-out and ill-conceived piece of legislation in the House.”
“Nor did the Government do so when it co-sponsored a resolution on the outcome of that judgment at the United Nations General Assembly. However, he differentiates today. He claims it is a necessity despite the Attorney General having advised that it is a political decision. Now Israel maintains that Sinn Féin's Bill to ban the sale of Israeli bonds is also illegal under EU law - claims absolutely rubbished by the legal opinion of the Oireachtas Office of Parliamentary Legal Advisers. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have shielded Israel's economy from legally correct sanction for its genocide for far too long. The sale of Israeli bonds in Ireland must be banned now. It is to the Government's shame that it is willing to provide economic cover for Israel's genocide for fear of a morally bankrupt European Commission President whom it put in office.”
“I acknowledge and commend the Irish Government on joining the case before the International Court of Justice against Israel taken under the Genocide Convention. I also commend the Government on the funding provided to UNRWA for humanitarian aid and for the recognition of the State of Palestine. However, that is where the commendation ceases. This Government has failed to implement a single solidarity economic sanction against the genocidal Israeli regime. Despite the Tánaiste having committed to pass the occupied territories Bill in advance of the general election, he now differentiates between goods and services to water down its impact. The International Court of Justice did not differentiate between trade in goods and services in its ruling on the consequences of Israel's action.”
“How will they afford these rents of up to €3,000 per month? For young people who are now out there trying to rent, how are they supposed to rent at €3,000 a month? They do not make this in their salaries. While many have given up hope of ever owning their own home, for those who have secured a mortgage, the Government continues to allow the banks to withhold the benefits of cuts to the European Central Bank interest rate. Irish banks have failed to pass on as many as four or five interest rate cuts to their consumers since the general election - squeezed homeowners, Government indifference. Sinn Féin has outlined what is needed to rectify this, namely, create a dedicated multimillion euro fund, stop artificially capping what councils can recoup and ensure a turnaround time of 12 weeks on council-owned properties.”
“Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have failed utterly to tackle the housing crisis. It is the number one issue in our country. Whether it be a renter's tax credit, a ban on no-fault evictions or limiting the level with which renters can be additionally burdened, in each incident the Government has dragged its feet in taking any action on this. What it has done has been too little and too late. In virtually every instance, the Government then finds false justification to reverse course in the face of a rental market even more cruel than before. Today, we hear that renters are once again to be punished for what are the Government's housing failures. Its haphazard proposal of a four-tier rent pressure zone regime will leave renters worse off. Has it thought about older people who are going to retire?”
“Economic uncertainty be damned when it comes to ordinary workers, young people and carers. If ordinary workers cannot afford to live, then businesses, especially local small-to-medium-sized businesses, cannot thrive. Sinn Féin’s approach is different and the proof is in the work of my party colleague, Caoimhe Archibald, the minister who recently introduced Sinn Féin's good jobs Bill in the Assembly. It is a Bill that will ensure fairer treatment of workers, including better net pay, tips, holiday pay and parental leave, which will promote a stronger regional economy that benefits businesses. I commend her on introducing that Bill, which sets out the standard for workers’ rights on this island. The Government here would do well to take notice and do the same.”
“All of this is self-defeating because when working people and families have chosen to pay rent rather than buy groceries, small businesses in their communities see decreased business and suffer too. This contributes to insolvencies. When workers attend work if they are ill and know they should not have to, this only contributes to the spread of flu and other illnesses. Does that not contribute to the strain on our health services and GP offices? What of the promise to end discriminatory subminimum youth pay rates? We cannot do that because of economic uncertainty, or so Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael will say. They will tell us that some young workers would be better off with more hours if they were saving for college because the price just went up €1,000 and rent pressure zones are on top of the chopping block.”
“Even though the Government realised its legislative framework failed to meet the minimum standards under EU law, it has taken seven years for it to meet its obligation to workers. While I would welcome this Bill as a break from a shameful past, the past few weeks have shown this to be anything but the case. Pension auto-enrolment is delayed, providing additional sick leave to workers is shelved and scrapping the carer’s means test is nowhere to be seen. Commitments made are delayed in the face of economic turbulence, or that is what this Government tells us out of one side its mouth at least. The explanation simply does not hold water. Out of the other side of their mouths, the same Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Ministers will tell us that cost-of-living measures are no longer necessary.”