Ivana Bacik
Dublin Bay South · Labour Party · Ireland
“Just today I and other local representatives got an email from the owner of two restaurants in Dublin city centre about this issue. The Minister of State’s brief includes not only the circular economy but also small business.”
“The Bill Deputy Sherlock and the Labour Party are proposing is not one we suggest is a silver bullet or a panacea but it offers one small, constructive mechanism to address the dysfunction in waste services.”
“In Dublin Bay South we have superb Tidy Towns organisations that I am proud to work with from Ringsend and Sandymount across to Portobello in my area to Rathgar, Rathmines, Terenure, Donnybrook and Ballsbridge. We see really important work being done by Tidy Towns organisations.”
“The owner says he no longer has space to accommodate additional recycling bins, cannot leave recyclable waste out for collection and cannot leave flattened cardboard outside for collection. Private waste companies must send a vehicle to collect this directly from premises. This is costly, inefficient and unnecessary.”
“I do not mean just in Dublin, though Deputy Sherlock and I are focusing on Dublin and most of the TDs present are Dublin ones, as clearly this has ramifications across the country and the dissatisfaction and the concerns Deputy Sherlock’s constituents and mine are expressing are ones felt across the board.”
“We want to see a move, as Deputy Sherlock has it in the Bill, from competition in the market to competition for the market and this Bill would represent an important positive step on that journey to quality public services provided by the State and to remunicipalisation. Deputy Sherlock has set out the detailed provisions in the Bill.”
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“The scheme has kept a roof over the heads of more than 2,500 households, but unfortunately, the Government is not sustaining it. Its funding is uncertain. The Government is now saying it will legislate to require landlords to disclose the rate of rent they charge tenants. That is something for which we have called for many years. A renters' register was in the first Bill I introduced as a TD in this House in 2021, the renters' rights Bill, but we need to see more from the Taoiseach and the Government. In particular, we need to see them reintroduce a measure that worked to slow homelessness rates during the Covid-19 pandemic, the ban on no-fault evictions. Will the Taoiseach consider this winter, a ban at least on child evictions? More than 5,000 children are now homeless and we are at risk of normalising child homelessness.”
“Renters have far too few rights in Ireland and the relationship with the landlord for far too many is defined by the existence of a toothless regulator and the threat of eviction, which is a very real threat, because tenants who pay their rent on time and comply with the terms of their leases can still be evicted if landlords need the property for a family member, to sell it, or if they purport to plan to sell it. The very worst manifestation for renters of the lack of rights is the threat and reality of eviction. Landlords continue to possess the broad liberty to evict tenants for no good reason and evictions are driving homelessness. To stop evictions, the tenant in situ scheme was supposed to be the safety net, funding councils to buy properties if tenants were at risk of homelessness.”
“The irony is that the private rental sector receives plenty of public money but it is through measures that do not address the root causes of the crisis. There was nothing in last week's budget to offer that radical reset of housing policy that is so badly needed. With the rental accommodation scheme and housing assistance payments, the State has taken responsibility off itself for housing those who should be in social housing. We all know that in the private rental sector there are thousands of would-be social tenants and thousands of would-be home owners who lack substantial protections such as security of tenure, affordability of rent and the ability to make their homes their own.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh all the visitors in the Public Gallery and the Distinguished Visitors Gallery. The Taoiseach just said that housing is the single biggest issue facing us. We all agree on that but I do not know whether the Taoiseach agrees that the housing system is broken. It has been commodified and marketised. The private rental sector is filling the gaps left by lengthy social housing lists. Far too many people are in homelessness and the Government has presided over an extraordinary failure and a significant shift. We have seen home ownership rates dropping and people in Ireland are now renting in far larger numbers, not by choice, but by necessity, yet the Government has failed to update the law to protect renters.”
“People will feel that common thread across generations persisting - a common thread of an uncertain future and an insecure present. We are a wealthy economy but a poor society, ravaged by a housing crisis and spiralling costs of living with nothing to address those spiralling costs for families and households. In these times, people look to the Government for increased security, improved public services and that minimum, essential standard of living that will give them the security they need. They will not find that security in this budget.”
“As I know the Ministers of State will acknowledge, our State finances are dependent on the whims of multinational companies and the billions of euro in taxes they contribute. That level of reliance on what has often been described as windfall taxes also generates an insecurity and instability for many. What the Labour Party, as a constructive party of opposition with a proud record on workers' rights and job creation, wanted to see in this budget were provisions for financing public services into the future and financing to secure futures for workers, families, parents and young adults looking to buy a home of their own. Instead, we see a lack of provision for the future and security and a lack of provision for housing, care, climate and work. We fear this is what will result from this budget.”
“We are hearing it from young adults and teenagers who are fearful of not having any future in this country and, with the housing crisis, fearful of never having the prospect of owning or even being able to rent a home of their own. We are hearing it from parents who are insecure about being able to find decent childcare and early years education for their children. They are desperate to secure places for children with autism and children with additional needs where there is simply so little available for them. There is a great deal of insecurity. Workers are squeezed by soaring prices. Social welfare and social protection rates have not kept pace with inflation. For years now, we have recommended indexing social protection to provide security to people who are vulnerable.”
“We acknowledge that global insecurity, but at a time when we are seeing record budget surpluses and when the Taoiseach, Tánaiste and the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, all boasted about the healthy state of the public finances at a macro level, this is when we should have seen a measure of security for people in this crucial budget and a commitment to giving security to families who are so hard pressed in a housing crisis and a cost-of-living crisis. People feel insecure and I know the Minister of State is aware of this because he hears it too. He hears it from an older generation who are fearful for their own future in a creaking health service with lack of provision for nursing home care and care in the home.”
“First up, however, on the schedule of works is a resurfacing of the boulevard of broken promises because never before has a budget document been so disconnected from the commitments made last year in the programme for Government. This budget is even more disconnected from the manifestos on which Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael canvassed voters for support less than one year ago. That is strikingly evident. What is also strikingly evident, when I travel the country and meet different families, communities and households, is how insecure people are feeling about the future. We in the Labour Party acknowledge the global climate of instability and uncertainty, such as the brutal genocide in Gaza, Russia's brutal war in Ukraine and the threat of Trump's tariffs ever pending and ever looming.”
“That is welcome but the increase in retrofit funding is completely inadequate. It is just as well the Government has built up its rainy day fund so much because these funds will have to pay the upcoming flood of fines we will face for missing our emissions targets. There is nothing here for nature or biodiversity, no transition to sustainable energy and an effective cut in active travel measures, when inflation is accounted for. Much of the public transport measures are already baked in but on the inception of this Government, I described its public transport policies as summed up by the phrase "‘Roads, baby, roads". We are certainly seeing more road building in this budget.”
“In the months leading up to this budget, we have seen eye-watering profits for major energy companies while they hike their prices for consumers. The Government was perfectly happy to issue blanket energy credits in recent budgets to everyone, even to those who did not need them, but now, suddenly, there is nothing left in the kitty to help families most at risk of poverty. Climate action is a real afterthought in this budget. That is very disappointing. We are really seeing the impact of the Green Party's departure from Government. We heard the usual performance just now from the Minister of State, Deputy Healy-Rae. We have certainly seen a Healy-Rae-shaped dent in funding to the climate Department, which has been reduced from last year’s allocation at a time of climate crisis. Yes, investing in our grid is long overdue.”
“Childcare has been a real damp squib. Deputy Marie Sherlock has pointed out that the Government is funding 2,300 additional places through the building blocks programme, but about 50,000 children are on waiting lists and there is no sign of that promised monthly cap on fees to €200 for childcare. It is bankrolling a system that receives generous public funding, but with no guarantee of places and no universal access for hard-pressed parents. On the issue of energy and the climate crisis, we are again seeing far too little. More than 300,000 people are in arrears on their electricity bills. A further 185,000 people are behind on their gas bills, but Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, the Lowry Independents and Deputy Healy-Rae have kicked them to the curb.”
“Last year in our children’s charter, the Labour Party developed a pathway for giving every child the best start in life and ending child poverty. That certainly kicked Fine Gael into gear. Nearly every speech the Tánaiste made during the general election was peppered with references to addressing child poverty. That was welcome but no sooner was the election over than the Government dropped that, too. We are seeing no second-tier child benefit in this budget, no reduction in class sizes and post-primary schools excluded from the hot school meals programme. When it comes to wealth transfers for developers, it seems the Government is happy to name its price but, despite announcing it twice now, it will not or cannot tell us how much it will put into DEIS Plus. We want to see DEIS Plus rolled out, but we are not seeing any detail on this.”
“Instead of a winter blitz on vacancy and dereliction, as the Labour Party proposed, it has proposed a new tax. We welcome the derelict property tax, but it seems it will not take effect until after 2028. We would have increased the vacant homes tax to ten times the local property tax. By contrast, what we saw announced yesterday will be ineffectual in driving the change needed to address the scourge of vacancy and dereliction. Instead, there is a tax package for developers and speculators, worth €500 million in just one year, and the Government has kicked the can down the road on the residential zoned land tax. Its allocation on so-called temporary housing solutions is an admission that our shameful rate of homelessness will go up, with more evictions and more children to add to the 5,000 who are in homelessness.”
“The winners are companies with high profits in a sector paying the lowest wages with the most exploited workers, and feeding nutritionally poor-quality food, mostly to those in Irish society who have the least. In other words, the Government's VAT cut is a direct wealth transfer to faceless fast food multinationals. It is a whopper, in fact, and a big fat nothing-burger for the rest of us. It is not a spice bag or a snack box. It is a smack-in-the-face box for most communities. It is a eurosaver for those at the top, but there is nothing for hard-pressed families or small independent businesses. Just as the Government caved to lobbyists on the VAT cut, so it has caved to the demands of landlords and developers on the housing package.”
“The Government has made a political choice to reward businesses with the highest turnover that will benefit most from this cut, with zero evidence of any positive impact on job retention or consumers. Worse again, many of the massive food chains that will benefit most are franchised to private equity firms, lots of which feed the pensions of people not living in Ireland. Others are owned by individual franchisees but they are posting record profits. We have looked into this. Let us take a sample of those franchisees operating individual McDonald’s branches in Ireland. One operator’s most recent financial reports recorded accumulated profits of €8.48 million. Another saw a post-tax profit of more than €13 million in one year. These are the winners.”
“It was a VAT cut the Labour Party uniquely opposed. We did not include it in our manifesto or budget last year, nor in our budget for this year, because we do not believe in narrowing the tax base in this way with no evidence the reductions will be passed on to consumers or will save jobs. This VAT cut will cost €232 million in 2026 and €681 million in a full year. Let us look at what the Government could have got for that. It will cost more than introducing a €25 cost-of-disability payment, which the Labour Party pushed for. It will cost more than abolishing the means test for carers, which we have also pushed for, more than capping childcare fees at €50 per week, and more than extending the back to school clothing and footwear allowance to every child in the country.”
“Excuse me. Labour is the party of jobs. We have a proud record, uniquely in opposition, of job creation. We have a proud record of standing for workers' rights. We do not take economic growth for granted. We welcome measures to support innovation, Enterprise Ireland and the development of AI. We absolutely welcome these, but these positive moves the Government has made are overshadowed by what is clearly the worst political choice in this budget of bad political choices. Its VAT cut for hospitality and hairdressing has to be the worst choice made in this budget, with one of the longest run-in times in history. Nobody could say the Government had not time to change its mind. It seems extraordinary to us in the Labour Party that this crazy VAT cut is the one election promise it decided to keep this year.”
“We welcome the allocation for the football academy, but our Aodhán Ó Ríordáin deserves a lot of the credit for getting the ball rolling on that. I take issue with the Taoiseach's charge that Opposition parties - it seems he lumped the Labour Party in with all Opposition parties - are anti-enterprise in some way. That is far from the truth.”
“We welcome the expansion of the living city initiative, which we have fought for, and the announcement of a new derelict property tax, but the timelines for both are so long out that we may never see them take effect. We welcome the increase in the minimum wage but where is the pathway to a living wage? We welcome the income disregard increase for carers, which is something that Deputy Mark Wall and the rest of us in the Labour Party have pushed for for years, but where are the meaningful changes for disabled persons and carers? We welcome the move to make permanent the basic income scheme for artists, but this was a Green Party initiative of the previous Government accompanied, let us not forget, by an overall cut in spending on culture and the arts.”
“The Government boasts a budget that contains targeted permanent measures. They are targeted, all right. There are giveaways for developers and large restaurant chains, but it is disappointing for so many others, including students who face a €500 fee increase; parents who see no reduction in childcare costs; families who are getting no help in addressing the cost-of-living crisis; and renters for whom there is no radical reset to increase the supply of homes. Indeed, it seems the Government has given up on people without a home. The height of the ambition in this is capped at investing more in hostel accommodation, not on ending the housing disaster. You know it is a bad budget when the Minister is forced to boast about retaining the Christmas bonus. There are welcome measures. We acknowledge that.”
“It just came out this morning. The PBO tells us that child poverty will increase next year as a result of the budget measures. The Tánaiste said that we should look at the Government's documents. I have looked at this document. We see middle-income households are also hit. The guide provided at the back of the tax policy change document shows this. It shows the changes for different income levels and family types, but there is a deliberate omission: there is no reference to couples with two incomes. Why? It is because they will be worse off after this budget. The inadequacy of measures would be starkly evident if they were included. The Government has left out dual-income households in a number of senses, and middle-income households, too. Why? They have been left out of the giveaway and left out in the cold.”
“There are giveaways for fast-food chains and developers but nothing for workers or families and derisory measures for children in poverty, those in housing insecurity or homelessness, and disabled people. It is lots of spin, but no substance. It is safe to say that this budget contains the single most right-wing tax package in living memory. As the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council points out, the full-year cost of the lavish pro-big business tax cuts is €2.3 billion. The Taoiseach said the poorest would benefit but we have seen the Parliamentary Budget Office analysis, which shows that income poverty will increase after this budget next year due to the removal of the one-off payment.”
“I first want to thank the Tánaiste for updating the House on the situation with the five Irish citizens illegally detained by Israel on the flotilla. We all think of our colleague, Deputy Heneghan, but also the writer, Ms Naoise Dolan, and the other citizens who were detained. Israel must be held accountable for the breaches of international law. The Tánaiste might please keep us updated on the fate of the Irish citizens. This is a budget, as Deputy Nash so memorably said, for burger barons and big builders, with broken promises for everyone else. There is real anger out there because there is a whiff of 2008 about this budget, with a strong seasoning of the Galway tent. In other words, it stinks.”
“No reference to the shocking figure of 5,000 children in homelessness. No reference to the proposal to introduce a second tier of child benefit, which is a really meaningful way in which we could have tackled child poverty. As Deputy Sherlock said, this could have been the game-changer for children and child poverty. Instead, the Government has chosen to give over €600 million in a giveaway - a whopper of a giveaway - for big fast-food chains and big business in the hospitality sector. That is a choice the Government made. The Labour Party, uniquely, in our manifesto last year, did not make that choice. We stood against that sort of crazy VAT cut. We did not stand for narrowing the tax base. We stand for decent public services and tackling child poverty and homelessness.”
“Certainly, in last year's budget there was a very different approach taken. It was a giveaway budget to buy people's votes. This year, the Government has made very different choices. Let us be clear about those choices. The Taoiseach referenced child poverty. We in Labour put forward last week a children's budget; a costed set of proposals that would have made meaningful steps to tackling the scourge of child poverty and child homelessness. In the Ministers' budget speeches, there was no reference to homelessness.”
“A €10 rise in core payments is derisory. It amounts to an hourly increase of less than six cent for someone providing 24-hour care and yet more than two thirds of caring families are struggling to cover the cost of food and energy in a cost-of-living crisis. The Taoiseach has failed disabled people and carers in this budget and that is really evident. It is a very significant broken promise among a litany of broken promises in a budget that is a do-nothing budget for far too many.”
“Our Labour alternative budget published last week proposed a 50% increase in housing adaptation grant funding to ease the burden of making a home accessible. The Government's budget could have taken steps like these to provide transformations in the lives of disabled people, but it left them out. It failed to introduce a cost of disability payment, ended one-off payments and introduced nothing new. In respect of carers, we do welcome the increase in the carer’s allowance disregard. Indeed, that is something that we and in particular my colleague, Deputy Wall, have been campaigning on for years. However, what is missing is progress on abolishing the mean-spirited means test. It is a broken promise. Where is the pathway to abolition that was committed to in the programme for Government less than a year ago?”
“One in five people unable to work due to disability lives in consistent poverty. Our social protection system has to intervene. There was great hope of significant intervention in this budget. Supports like the disability allowance and disability support grant are essentials, covering costs in heating, food, medication and rent, funding day-to-day expenses of disabled people and carers in an inaccessible society. The removal of one-off support payments in this budget is expected to cost disabled people €1,400 per year. That is not loose change; it is money that keeps the lights on. By contrast, Labour in government would introduce a cost of disability payment, starting at €25 per week, to help to meaningfully offset the costs of disability.”
“Yesterday’s budget was a deep disappointment. There is real anger out there. The Government made choices in this budget that are impacting really adversely on so many people. As my colleague Deputy Nash said in what I think was the line of the day yesterday, this is a budget that is giving handouts to burger barons and big builders, but broken promises for everyone else. People see that, and this is raw for students facing a €500 fee increase, parents seeing no reduction in childcare costs - when they can get a childcare place - families struggling with the cost-of-living crisis and people unable to find a home of their own and, of course, nothing for disabled people or carers. This was derisory for those people. Here in Ireland, employment rates for people with disabilities are 20% lower than the European average.”
“We can and should do more because we are a powerful voice on the international stage, and a powerful voice for the people of Palestine. We need to progress the occupied territories Bill with much greater speed and to cover both goods and services. We need to ensure we have no trade with Israel as it commits genocide, and that we are pushing at the strongest level, a European level, to ensure that at EU level too there is an end to trade and effective sanctions on Israel.”
“We have been watching with horror as over 60,000 civilians in Gaza have been killed under bombardment and man-made famine. We have watched children being killed and maimed. We have watched medics and journalists being killed. A doctor interviewed this week spoke about the horror of standing by a small girl's bedside as she died from bombardment. Her entire family had been wiped out by a bombardment. These are unimaginable horrors and we have to do all we can. Before I hand to Deputy Duncan Smith, I want to finish by saying again that we have always welcomed what the Government has done. We recognise the Irish Government has been to the fore, along with our colleagues in the Spanish Government, led by our socialist colleague Pedro Sánchez. They have been to the fore in calling out Israel and standing in solidarity with Gaza.”
“My colleague Deputy Duncan Smith will take on the asking of questions to the Tánaiste and I know the Tánaiste has outlined the efforts being made at diplomatic level by our ambassador, by the Tánaiste himself and by our Department of foreign affairs at the highest level to secure the safety of Irish citizens on the flotilla and, more broadly, an end to the horrific genocide in Gaza. The Tánaiste has already articulated this, as have I. All of us hope there will be a sustainable peace in Gaza. All of us have enormous concerns about the peace proposals that have been put forward but, certainly, we want to see an end to the genocide, the bringing about of a sustainable ceasefire and a sustainable two-state solution for the people of Palestine.”
“I again express our enormous sympathy and solidarity with the families, who must be undergoing enormous distress and concern as they are unable to watch what is going on because so little communication has been possible as a result of the Israeli action. On behalf of Labour, I condemn Israel for this latest flagrant breach of international law - intercepting a flotilla of ships whose only mission was to draw attention to the horrific genocide being perpetrated by Israel upon the people of Gaza and to seek to bring aid to the civilians in Gaza, who are enduring such unimaginable suffering.”
“We were watching the deployment of water cannon against them, the use of intimidating and frightening tactics by Israel against them and then, of course, most recently and dramatically last night, the illegal detention - abduction, really - of, we think, 15 Irish citizens. I think the Tánaiste said 15 or 16 Irish citizens, among them our colleague in the Oireachtas Senator Chris Andrews, my own constituency colleague. I want to send a particular message to Chris. We know that another Member of the Oireachtas, Deputy Barry Heneghan, is in the broader flotilla. A number of other Irish citizens have also been abducted by Israel. We have had some of their families in this Chamber just recently.”
“First, like others, I acknowledge the horrific attack on a synagogue in Manchester. I send me deepest sympathies to the families of the two deceased. I understand there are a number of other people injured. It is horrific. I condemn outright what appears to have been a blatantly antisemitic attack on Yom Kippur. I also acknowledge the importance of having made time for this debate today. This is unprecedented. The circumstances are extraordinary, as we see a rapidly evolving situation and a number of Irish citizens put at risk. All of our thoughts and concerns are with those citizens on the Global Sumud Flotilla, who have been part of a humanitarian and who have endured a great deal of intimidation from Israel over recent days, even before the awful events of last night. We were all following what was going on.”
“Can the Minister, as the line Minister, explain to those who work for such organisations providing such vital services why they are not being paid on time during a cost-of-living crisis? Why has there, apparently, been no sanction for this money from the Departments of justice or public expenditure? I think it is a very serious matter.”
“We know that workers and organisations in the community and voluntary sector provide essential supports to victims and survivors of sexual, domestic and gender-based violence. Yet organisations under sections 39, 56 and 10 are continuing to suffer from severe uncertainty in terms of their finances because of the Government's failure to clarify matters. As of last week, Cuan, which is the Minister's Department’s statutory agency tasked with reducing the incidence of gender-based violence, had made no contact with more than 70 organisations it funds. We understand the Department of justice, the Minister's Department, was supposed to release funding to Cuan to pay the organisations so they could pay their workers and staff. Moneys were meant to be paid by 1 October to go to payroll this month. We understand that has not come through.”
“Appeals Centre Europe, which is based Ireland, issued a transparency report today. It says that only 78 eligible disputes emerged from Ireland between November 2024 and August 2025 and only 50 decisions have issued. Given the widespread proliferation of online abuse, toxic language and horrible threats, it is extraordinary that so few decisions have been made by this body, which is supposed to be safeguarding citizens' rights. The decisions it makes are not even legally binding on platforms. What are the Government's plans to reassure citizens that our data will be private?”
“I thank the Minister for that response. It is welcome to hear that his officials are engaging with the DPC on this and that the DPC is using the statutory powers. I am also glad that the Minister confirmed to me what I had said at the start which is that the DPC does have adequate statutory powers and that the issue is about the usage and application of those powers. The Minister said that one of the brokers is based here in Ireland. That is welcome because clearly enforcement proceedings will be more straightforward. He said there is another in another EU country. He might clarify which EU country that is. It is vital that there is follow up here in relation to data brokers who are acting in flagrant disregard of GDPR and of our own data protection laws. However, individuals still have concerns.”
“The Tánaiste offered me only a holding response and nothing of substance and the Government did not put up a spokesperson on the “Prime Time” programme that evening. What is the Minister doing to protect the privacy rights of our communities and, because we are an EU tech hub, what is he doing to protect privacy across the EU? Let us be clear: this poses not only a risk to individuals but also to our national cybersecurity. We know that Ireland lacks an adequate overarching strategy to guard against cyber attack. We saw that with the HSE ransomware attack recently.”
“As the Minister knows, the DPC has the statutory powers it needs to protect the privacy of smartphone users in this country and we know this but, to date, it has not taken necessary action to protect people whose smartphone data is up for sale right now. It is welcome that the DPC has announced it will commence investigations with a view to taking enforcement proceedings against two of the companies featured in the “Prime Time" programme but the question remains: why did the DPC not use its existing statutory powers sooner to protect people’s privacy? Why has the Government taken such a hands-off approach to this? I raised this in this Chamber two weeks ago in advance of the “Prime Time” programme.”
“Following the recent “Prime Time” programme just last month, the Data Protection Commission, DPC, has pledged to look into this matter at last but it seems that the best response the Government could give was a watery commitment to looking at the possibility of vague new laws. Frankly that is not good enough nor is it appropriate. As I made clear, the GDPR already contain the safeguards necessary to enable the DPC to take the action that is needed to prevent the sale of data where no meaningful or informed consent has been given as it could not be given when we see this absolutely brazen use of data in this way.”
“Threats against public representatives and their families represent a threat to democracy. They undermine our political system and they deter people from entering politics. This is a very serious issue but it is not new. It affects the civil liberties of all our citizens and not just those in public life. As long ago as 2020, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, ICCL, undertook a similar exercise to RTÉ’s “Prime Time” team. It purchased data, identifying 200 Irish people who had been tagged as survivors of abuse but despite handing those findings to the Minister's predecessor and the Data Protection Commission, no action was taken at the time to protect the privacy of individuals.”
“The recent RTÉ “Prime Time" programme into the purchase of mobile phone location data was shocking. For very little money, and with very little effort, journalists were able to buy data which tracked the journeys of smartphone users across Ireland, based in different locations. They even tracked naval vessels, people in Irish prisons and they tracked phones here in Leinster House. Using this data, as we know, they were able to trace the residential addresses of political representatives. The Minister and Deputy Barry Ward were featured in the programme. It was particularly chilling - and the findings were chilling - given the recent reports of very serious online abuse and threats of violence against the Tánaiste, Simon Harris and his family. I want again to condemn absolutely outright those threats.”
“I condemn outright the attacks on the flotilla perpetrated by Israel, a flagrant breach of international law. We can and must do more to call out Israel's actions on this. As we all hope for a ceasefire and for a path to sustainable peace for the people of Palestine, we know Israel must be held accountable for the horrors it has inflicted on the people. More than 60,000 are dead and there is devastation, bombardment, man-made famine and children dying in their thousands. This cannot be allowed to continue and I express our solidarity with those in the flotilla who are calling it out, as we all must do in the House and throughout the country.”
“I will share time with my colleague Deputy Duncan Smith. On behalf of the Labour Party, I welcome the motion. I also express our solidarity with all those on the Global Sumud Flotilla. We think especially of the Irish activists on board the flotilla, including our colleagues in the Oireachtas, Deputy Barry Heneghan and Senator Chris Andrews from my constituency. I acknowledge the family members of those on the flotilla, and say they must be so worried about their family members who are on board but they should also be justifiably proud of those in the flotilla. We owe them an immense debt of gratitude for standing up and taking a courageous stance and calling out the brutal genocide being perpetrated by Israel upon the people of Gaza. The brave and courageous stance they are taking is important in a global context.”
“It is unsatisfactory. I add my voice to that. We do need to raise this at the Business Committee. Clearly, the debate on the motion on the flotilla is hugely important. We all looked for that so on this occasion, there is no difficulty with moving straight to that debate. However, in principle, to have just two groupings of Taoiseach's Questions when we have all prepared for three is not acceptable and we need to change that.”
“Will the Taoiseach take the urgent action in this budget, which is so obviously needed, to invest in the protection of biodiversity and to reverse some of the decisions made? We are very concerned that the ban on imported fracked gas has been overturned and that it looks as if his Government is opening the door to more fossil fuel infrastructure.”
“The European Environment Agency's recent report is nothing short of damning. It sets out the reality for biodiversity and finds that Ireland's natural environment is in very poor condition. Some 85% of protected habitats and almost one third of protected species have an unfavourable status. It is clear that excessive car dependency, unsustainable food production and emissions that are simply not reducing at a fast enough rate are doing untold damage to biodiversity. We are seeing an outrageous situation in Dublin Bay with sewage being pumped into our waters. Swim bans are the norm on far too many beaches and there are fish kills on lakes and rivers with alarming regularity. We need urgent systemic action in this budget. We need to ensure the budget will take climate seriously.”