Marie Sherlock
Dublin Central · Labour Party · Ireland
“That is why I want to see our local authorities moving from being just bystanders that license waste collection companies to actually controlling how the service is delivered.”
“That is why I want to pay tribute to all the people who are here today, including Stoneybatter Pride of Place, Phibsboro Village Tidy Towns and all the people working within their communities to keep them clean.”
“Panda’s parent company, Beauparc, sold for €1.3 billion in 2021 to an Australian investment firm. It is also co-owned by a US private equity firm. They are not in Ireland for the good of their health. They are here because they know they can make serious money. We know Greyhound’s parent company is registered on the Isle of Man.”
“The other important thing to say is that we did not hear any new ideas today, and I say that with the greatest respect to the Minister of State. We did not hear any ideas with regard to the profound challenges we have regarding our plateauing recycling rates and all the other issues that are there. That is disappointing.”
“I pay tribute to a lot of the work that many officials and workers in Dublin City Council do because, in some ways, their hands are tied behind their back. They recognise the issue with regard to landlord responsibility. I am very disappointed to hear the Minister of State's comments about landlord responsibility.”
“Dublin City Council was able to negotiate for the installation of ten-tonne compactors in the commercial areas, yet when it came to the residential areas, I understand the council tried to negotiate with the bin collectors on the roll-out of shared collection systems, but to no avail. That pretty much sums up our dysfunctional system.”
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“Many of those people had dementia and they had nowhere to go out of our acute hospitals into more appropriate settings. The other critical issue I want to raise today is access to social welfare so that when a person, in particular someone under the age of 65, does develop a dementia-related condition, there is an understanding. Again, far too many people have come to our office and other people's offices trying to access disability payments and have not been approved or have had enormous difficulty trying to get through the bureaucratic nightmare of trying to prove their condition and their inability to work. I have to ask that the Minister of State use his office to convey a greater understanding to others. The last thing I want to say today is with regard to how health inequality applies to so many aspects of our health service.”
“The other key thing is that not everybody will be able to stay in their home. With regard to long-term residential care, there has been a 12% drop in the number of dementia-specific community beds over the past five years. There are now 353 beds, 332 of which are long-stay beds and 21 of which are respite beds. The number of respite places has doubled. That is very welcome but it is obviously coming from an incredibly low base. For the people who I come across who are caring for their loved ones, not being able to access dementia supports is an enormous issue. I spoke earlier in the Dáil about the delayed transfers of care out of our hospitals. It reached 555 people yesterday. It is the highest on record in the year to date. We know that 602 of those people in the first four months of this year were waiting for clinically complex beds.”
“I know the Minister of State takes a particular interest in that area. The provision of home care support packages across the country is very patchy. Here in Dublin, access is much easier, but in the south west and my own home county of Cork, it is extraordinarily difficult. If we are to allow people the dignity and independence of staying at home and afford them some sort of dignity as they deal with their condition, we must ensure that home care support packages are put in place. Part of this question relates to the model on which the State has relied up until now. There is huge reliance on private organisations and there have been a lot of issues in how some of those services have been delivered. We must look at increasing the number directly employed by the HSE in the sector.”
“Those who have these lesser known or less familiar conditions sometimes have an enormous uphill battle in trying to access diagnostics and then the appropriate level of services. While there are brilliant supports, such as dementia cafés, across many communities in this country, those under the age of 65 are often hidden from view. I particularly think of the 2,277 people under the age of 65 who are in nursing homes across this country. Some are there because of an acquired brain injury but many are there because of dementia-related conditions. We have to ask whether that is the appropriate place for them. The critical issue in this discussion has to be the infrastructure of support for those suffering from dementia in Ireland. There is an enormous job of work to be done to ensure we have proper home care supports.”
“Within my own community, I have been struck by people talking about Jordan and Cian's mission, the 33 marathons in 33 days, and the powerful message it sent as regards raising awareness and the call for greater research into, and understanding of, FTD. I thank them for all of their work. They have been an incredible inspiration. Almost 70,000 people in this country live with dementia. While many of us think of it as an older person's condition, it is important to say that there quite a number of people out there suffering from early onset dementia. There is also Korsakoff syndrome, Huntington's disease, posterior cortical atrophy, progressive supranuclear palsy and Lewy body disease.”
“I will be sharing time with my colleague, Deputy Lawlor. I pay tribute to the work of the Alzheimer Society of Ireland in its many years of fighting for this cause. I also pay tribute to my colleague, Deputy George Lawlor, who is co-chair of the Oireachtas working group on Alzheimer's disease. I warmly welcome Jordan and Cian Adams, who we had the pleasure of meeting earlier today. I have been bowled over by how they have turned their grief into such power. They have been an inspiration to thousands of people across this country, including people who might not ordinarily be clued into issues relating to dementia because it may not have directly affected their lives.”
“Many in the medical community with expertise in this area are of the view that specialised sparing liposuction surgery - there is big distinction from other types of cosmetic liposuction - is the only intervention that can directly address the pathological adipose tissue issues. Many women have to travel to Cyprus and other countries to access those surgical interventions. Serious consideration has to be given to that surgical intervention in Ireland. Some women who believe they have this condition are seeking liposuction in a setting not specific to lipoedema, which is very worrying. We need to make sure we can provide for these women in this country.”
“My question concerns lipoedema. It is a condition experienced by an estimated 11% of women in this country. We understand a working group was set up in 2023 and was due to report in the second quarter of this year. We have not seen it yet. When will we see that report? I raise significant concern about the outcome of the report, in that the HSE has indicated it relates only to diagnosis and non-surgical management, when we understand surgery should be an important part of the care of these women.”
“Obviously, there are a whole range of issues as to why people do not leave hospital. Almost 70% of the cases relate to a need for residential care or complex care such as dementia. The big issue is the cost. We know the HSE is running a significant deficit at the moment. It will not even make the savings it is supposed to make at the end of this year. We know the cost of an acute daybed is about €1,300, which is almost five times the cost of a community nursing unit bed. This has a very real financial implication for hospitals. The question being asked of me is about the tolerance and particularly the very long average waiting times across our acute hospitals. We need to see a much greater urgency with regard to a nursing home capacity plan, which would be a public nursing home capacity plan.”
“I am glad to hear a capacity expansion plan will be put in place but, like the acute hospital expansion plan, it has been sitting there for a number of years and I am not hearing urgency with regard to this problem.”
“The average waiting time in DTOC is 24.8 days across all acute hospitals and in the midlands and north-east Dublin it is more than 30 days. This is a huge cause for alarm in terms of risk to the patients themselves and their prospects of recovery but also the cost to the hospital. We know that nursing home demand is the biggest driver of this, with more than 1,500 people waiting for a nursing home space, but I have to ask about the urgency with regard to the Government's response. In 2022, ESRI research identified that we would need somewhere between 54,000 and 60,000 nursing home beds. We had 33,000 beds back in 2022. We have gone backwards and in 2025 we had fewer beds at 32,408. We are not even running to stand still.”
“My question relates to delayed transfers of care and nursing home capacity. I understand that yesterday marked the highest number of delayed transfers of care across our acute hospitals in the year to date, with 555 patients who should have been discharged and were not. This marks 86 continuous days of over 500 delayed transfers of care in our hospitals. For the first four months of this year, almost 50% of those waiting to leave hospital were waiting for a nursing home place. What is the response to this crisis?”
“It is a fundamental disappointment that the Minister of State is just looking at some of the recommendations and not looking at them in the round. It is a whole-of-government approach. My appeal to both the Minister of State and the Minister is that they bring this to the Cabinet and the rest of the Ministers. The Taoiseach’s response that we have had a health scheme in place for the past number of years and that it is working does not cut the mustard. It is not working.”
“A health referral and health diversion scheme was promised back in 2017, so we are almost ten years waiting for that. The reality is the Minister of State is fundamentally misunderstanding why we have recommended decriminalisation. It is not an end in itself. Depenalisation is to ensure that we breakdown the stigma and shame of addiction in this country. It is to ensure that people can access services and that we end the war on drugs that has not worked. The Minister of State can walk around her community or my community – it has not worked. If we are serious about a comprehensive health-led approach, and the citizens’ assembly was very clear on this, it means dissuasion, diversion and decriminalisation. It cannot be cherry-picking one or two out of the three.”
“That to me is wrong. The reality is the issues are way too serious for that. There were 343 drug-induced deaths in our country in 2022. That is the latest available data. Over 80% of those in our prisons have addiction. Look at our communities. We need to change how we do things on drugs. To be honest, the Minister of State rejecting one of the recommendations less than 24 hours after publication is frankly not good enough. It is a knee-jerk response and it is anti-evidence.”
“I thank the Minister of State. That is certainly very welcome. I say genuinely to the Minister of State and the senior Minister in the Department that there is a real opportunity to show leadership and to prove their credentials by getting things done with regard to this particular issue. Our committee heard hundreds of hours of evidence from 82 witnesses since April last year. It was an incredibly extensive look at all the issues. The reality is that the Minister of State outright rejected our recommendation of decriminalisation. There was an apparent misrepresentation of what the citizens' assembly actually said and she conflated decriminalisation with legalisation.”
“As the Minister of State knows, the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Drugs Use published a report two weeks ago. It is a detailed report, with 161 detailed recommendations set out over 134 pages. I have to convey to the Minister of State the deep dismay and disappointment caused by her comments in response to the report some 24 hours after its publication. Will the Department of Health issue a detailed response to each of the recommendations?”
“There are other houses that are lying empty. There has been a huge issue with regard to State funding in this space, but the Government also needs to ensure that sheltered housing is put in place for those with intellectual disabilities when their parents or others in the family can no longer care for them. It is utterly unacceptable that people reach an older age and have nowhere to go but nursing homes.”
“It is failing because of the lack of forward planning and a failure to put in place the infrastructure to ensure that those with intellectual disabilities can live a fulsome life in the community. The second key issue here concerns the theory behind the assisted decision-making Act. I very much welcome the intention to have a much greater human rights approach, but the reality is that the approach that was supposed to help the very people envisaged in that Act is actually undermining the State services that should be put in place to ensure that they live as full a life as possible. This State has failed to plan. When I talk to the section 38 and section 39 organisations, they tell me about the extent to which their hands are tied. They have properties but they can only put a certain number of rooms into them.”
“I very much welcome this very important motion and thank Deputy Quaide and the Social Democrats for it. I start by paying tribute to the Before We Die campaign, particularly Tony and Susan Murray, Alan and Vera Hughes and the thousands of other parents across the country who have had to tell their stories, lay their lives bare and tell the story of their children in order to advocate for others. There needs to be a conversation. We very much supported the theory behind decongregation when it was put in place 20 years ago. While we recognise that the theory of decongregation made absolute sense in principle, there has to be a recognition that in practice, it is failing.”
“Deputy Aindrias Moynihan - To discuss the need for additional accommodation at Coachford Primary School. Deputy Louis O'Hara - To discuss supports for households affected by the ending of the cessation of turf cutting compensation scheme. Deputies Conor D. McGuinness and Natasha Newsome Drennan - To discuss CDNT issues in Waterford and the south east. Deputy Ruairí Ó Murchú· - To discuss the issues being created in the court system by the new legal aid model. Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire - To discuss progress of the Cork southern distributor link multi-modal route. The matters raised by Deputies Louis O'Hara, David Cullinane, Shane Moynihan and Aindrias Moynihan have been selected for discussion.”
“I wish to advise the House of the following matters in respect of which notice has been given under Standing Order 39 and the name of the Member in each case: Deputy Albert Dolan - To discuss the need to support existing retail investors though implementing the funds 2030 review. Deputy Malcolm Byrne - To discuss the need for the development of Bunclody Community College, Bunclody, County Wexford. Deputy Marie Sherlock - To discuss the enforcement of e-scooter legislation. Deputy Thomas Gould - To discuss the usage of scramblers, e-bikes and e-scooters in Cork city. Deputy David Cullinane - To discuss the need to develop Dunmore East harbour to facilitate fishing, leisure, and cruise activity. Deputy Shane Moynihan - To discuss the progress in provision of a new school building at Scoil Chrónáin.”
“I ask the Taoiseach to ensure the OPW shows greater ambition for meanwhile use of the GPO, so that it becomes a proper living and thriving institution for the next few years while we understand what its future use will be.”
“While I warmly welcome the announcement of the public consultation on the future of the GPO, I express my deep disappointment in the plans for the meanwhile use. There are 4,000 sq. m of enormous potential in the heart of Dublin, yet we are hearing it is going to be allocated to office space, with some vague notion of cultural and community space. We know there is a very sizeable office vacancy rate in Dublin. The OPW has also had empty office space for a considerable period. We know there is a massive shortage of artists' space in Dublin. I would love the OPW to show real ambition for the meanwhile use of the GPO space. The State's plans for an artists' campus in Dublin Port have been put on hold and we know there is a big gap in Dublin with regard to artists' space.”
“The Department needs to seriously look at and build on the work of DEIS plus and all that, by looking at particular schools and the transition into the primary school system. While the early childhood care and education, ECCE, programme is fantastic, it is a one size fits all and that is not good enough, nor should it be the height of ambition for the Department of education. Particularly in disadvantaged communities and diverse fast-growing communities like East Wall, it is critical we hear from the Department that it is willing to continue funding the post and this class long into the future. The teachers tell me they can see the results when a child goes into junior infants and that has to be recognised and broadened out in the education system.”
“My request is that the Department show ambition, particularly regarding communities where not every child goes to school equal at the age of five. The role and value of the reception class is critical, not just for the East Wall area and it should be looked at in other areas. It is also important to say, as I understand it, this is not the first time there has been a wobble in the Department about the reception class for St. Joseph's. The class started 43 years ago. It was terminated around 1999-2000 but the Department reinstated it in 2002. That is the critical thing. This class has worked for generations of people in East Wall. It has worked for other schools as well. Unfortunately, it was taken away in other schools.”
“I passionately believe these classes have a very important role particularly in disadvantaged communities. Will there be ongoing certainty for St. Joseph's in East Wall with regard to the continuation of that reception class into the future? It has certainty for the coming school year but not beyond that. There is an enormous appetite and demand within the local community to ensure that the reception class, albeit that it is unique across the education system, continues long into the future to support children to adapt to the primary school environment.”
“Earlier this year, the school was told that it was going to lose the post that allows it to continue running that class, which would have a devastating impact for many across the community. The reality is we do not have many preschools in the East Wall area. We have two preschools, and then you have to go as far as Seán McDermott Street to access the next preschool. There is a huge gap in the area, but that alone is not a justification for holding on to the reception class. The reception class does amazing work. The Holy Child Pre-School in Rutland Street, which started as a pilot, has performed a similar and brilliant role over many decades but it has been left in limbo by the Department. There has been a reduction in the early intervention classes being run out of primary schools in recent years.”
“That reception class is critically important in affording children the ability to access supports for language development, school readiness and transition into junior infants. We know that not every child going into junior infants in this country goes in as an equal. There is no level playing field. Some children, particularly in more advantaged families go into primary school with far greater social and educational skills, but it is different in other areas. In particular we know there is uneven access to literacy and numeracy for preschool-going children. The reality is that this is a very important class that has worked well for many decades in St. Joseph's Co-Educational Primary School.”
“My question relates to the reception class in St. Joseph's Co-Educational Primary School in East Wall in Dublin 3. A reception class has been running there since 1984. It is in its 43rd year. It is a pre-junior infants class, so effectively there is a three-year infant cycle. It was one of four pioneering schools that has run such a class. Now there is only one school in the country providing such a reception class. The fantastic thing about this reception class is that it is not like preschool or a crèche . It is about the first step in adapting to the school environment in disadvantaged communities, such as my own in Dublin Central and particularly in East Wall, which is a really diverse community that has had many decades of disadvantage.”
“We need to make sure the right investment goes into dental services and, in particular, there needs to be an absolute focus on prevention so that we are not storing up greater issues for our health service further down the line.”
“We know we need to add dental nurses and hygienists to critical skills lists. The other key issue for me is that notion of an apprenticeship scheme for dentists. I remember 20 years ago, which was a time dentists were coming out of college around the same time as myself. Dentists were able to do part-time work with the HSE and part-time with a private practice. It was excellent training for that year after they graduated. Many dentists stayed in the private system but continued to provide that public care through the DTSS. Unfortunately, that system fell away in the intervening years and we do not have that nature of apprenticeship now within our dental services in this country. That needs to be restored. The plea is that we will not be standing here again this time next year talking about the same issues.”
“This is not about a free pass for dentists. This is about a serious negotiation. The other aspect of it that is critically important is what is actually available within the DTSS. It is frankly bizarre if you have had two fillings and require a third one in a particular year, you have to wait a further year but there is no limit on the number of extractions done. That is from the dark ages and we have to change how the dental treatment services scheme is designed. It is also critically important to say the recruitment of dentists needs to be significantly looked at. We know there has not been any significant expansion or investment into our dental schools in decades. Barely half of the 70 dentists who graduate in Ireland each year opt to practise here in the long term.”
“We know children have to travel to either Louth or Kildare to get general anaesthetic if that becomes available and, of course, they are in the queue with everybody else from that area. The reality with the dental treatment services scheme, DTSS, is that we have seen a drastic reduction in the willingness of dentists to participate in it over the last number of years. We must have a serious conversation with dentists about that. It is not good enough to just wave our arms in the air and say there are dentists going into cosmetic surgery and they should stay in dentistry. We need to have a serious conversation about the number of dentists who are currently in the private system and the number who would be willing to get involved with the dental treatment services scheme if the conditions were right.”
“Surely, the ambition and aim of all of us here should be to ensure we are looking after people's health as opposed to ill-health further down the line. I very much welcome in particular the reference to general anaesthetic services in this motion because the reality is there are hundreds of children across this country who need general anaesthetic to receive dental care. Many are waiting over a year. There are children and special care adults left in excruciating pain with simply nowhere to go. We know people have to travel very long distances. In the south west, 310 people with additional needs are waiting more than a year for general anaesthetic. In some parts of the country, like my own area of Dublin north city and west, there is no special care service for children at all.”
“Last year, I relayed a story in this Chamber of a public dentist telling me that she had patients, who were no longer children because they were driving a car, driving themselves to an appointment they were supposed to get in sixth class but they were in fifth or sixth year by the time that appointment came through. That is absolutely unacceptable and the costs we are storing up for our health service further down the line because of those delays to care is frankly outrageous. We know there was a 30% drop in the number of children attending these scheduled assessments between 2019 and 2024. The reality is there is a bit of a ticking time bomb here. If we do not put the money in early to the preventative aspect of our dental healthcare system, we will end up with a health system that has much greater costs further down the line.”
“They are the ones suffering from real inequality. People are genuinely delayed for months, just to save the money needed to get basic treatment. With regard to children, the number of children participating in targeted programmes and scheduled appointments within community dental services has significantly dropped. We know that across all CHO areas, the number of children in first and second class, or fifth and sixth class and other targeted groups, attending scheduled appointments has dropped dramatically over the past five years. Tens of thousands of children are leaving primary school without any basic checks.”
“If that were to happen within GP care, there would be absolute uproar and alarm - rightly so. Yet, we are not seeing that same level of attention or care for our public health service. The reality is that as of April this year, there are just 232 whole-time equivalent dentists across the public health service. In 2009, there were 330. It is scandalous that we have seen such a decline. I know from talking to public dentists on the ground there are enormous challenges with regard to trying to get additional dentists recruited into the system. Business cases sit there for months on end. That is absolutely unacceptable if we are to take public dental care seriously. The reality is that those on medical cards and those who struggle to afford to see a dentist are the ones who are most disadvantaged by this.”
“We know that children in particular are not getting the dental care they need. Along with anybody else who was contributing to the debate last year, we looked at the drop in the number of public dentists and those participating in the dental treatment scheme. It is devastating to see and was reflected in the cross-party report that Deputy Rice spoke about. It was from the Oireachtas health committee and was published a number of months ago. It very clearly set out what needs to happen. We have seen little or no response from the Department of Health since then. Earlier this year, the Irish Dental Association told our committee that more than half of dentists had withdrawn from the medical card scheme, leaving thousands of patients without the free care they are entitled to.”
“One of the critical things we know about dental care is that prevention is as important as treatment. We know the one organisation that was set up 40 years ago to promote oral health awareness, the Dental Health Foundation, lost a massive chunk of its funding a number of years ago. We have to ask serious questions about the seriousness and intent of the Department of Health with regard to oral healthcare in this country. We know that so many people out there are now having to go abroad for cosmetic dental surgeries to make up for years of neglect by the public dental system. The size of your wallet should not determine your health, yet, in oral healthcare in particular, it absolutely is the case. People are no longer just afraid of the dentist's chair. They are terrified of the cost of visiting the dentist.”
“I very much welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion and I thank Sinn Féin for introducing it this evening. The Labour Party will very much be supporting this motion. The Government has effectively watched our public community dental services collapse over the last decade. It is very clear that oral healthcare is very much the poor relation of the health service. It is almost a year to the day since we had a debate in this Chamber last year, with a motion then sponsored by Deputy Stanley. It is clear that almost little or nothing has happened since then. We are seven years on since the smile agus sláinte national strategy on dental care was published, yet we have seen a deterioration and disregard for public dental services in this country.”
“In March we all warmly welcomed the purchase of the site in Raheen in Limerick for the much-needed expansion of acute hospital capacity in the mid-west region. In March there was a commitment to establishing a new board and that there would be an initial report by this September. What is the delay in the formation of that board? Is that September date now off the table? Is there a timeline for the formation of the board and that initial report? Is resourcing an issue?”
“We need to change the whole framework of grants to ensure those in both social and private housing can collectively receive support from the SEAI to make meaningful changes to retrofit their homes and permanently lower their costs. We feel that the Minister has his head in the clouds with regard to the true level of the issue out there in terms of the energy bills and arrears that households are dealing with. We want to see a real change in how the Government deals with the level of need out there.”
“A woman who came to me yesterday had a bill of €1,200 in the middle of May. There are thousands of others like her across the country. I hear the Minister dancing on the head of a pin about 500,000 household energy accounts that are in long-term arrears. That is what we are talking about. For the Minister to get defensive about the level of arrears in this country is simply wrong. He needs to engage regarding the level of need that exists. We believe there needs to be a complete change with regard to how we retrofit households across this country. At the moment, those who are able to access the grants have means. The many who do not have those means week in, week out, and who are living from week to week, cannot access the grants.”
“Some of us here accept that there is a role in many economies for data centres. However, when one notes that data centres account for 22% of our energy, and when the Minister for enterprise, Deputy Burke, talks about data centre activity being a strategic opportunity for the Irish economy to bring forward the green transition, nothing could be further from the truth. The reality is that data centres are sucking up the renewable energy generated in the Irish economy, which needs to be going to real households. We need to see a significant change in the approach of the Government. It has become the cornerstone of industrial policy. We need to see that changed for the households I deal with in Dublin Central and the 14% of low-income households that are in dire circumstances.”
“I thank my colleague Deputy Ahern for introducing this really important and timely motion. It is frankly shambolic that, more than six months into 2026, we still have yet to see a national climate action plan. That speaks volumes about this Government and its commitment to climate mitigation in this country. Instead of a Government prioritising clean, cheap energy for the many, we have had to introduce this motion because of the huge drain that data centres represent to our grid at this point, with real-world consequences for so many households across the country. It is absolutely shambolic that the vast majority of the renewable resources being developed are going towards data centres as opposed to reducing bills and making a meaningful impact on the utility bills of households across the country.”
“My appeal to the Minister of State is for the Government to back this proposal tomorrow night - not just have a free vote - and give a firm and clear commitment it will progress the abolition of the three-day wait as speedily as possible, ideally before we rise for the recess, because there will be women who will be affected by our lack of action in the Dáil over the summer and into the winter months.”
“If we are to take the key message from the 2018 referendum to repeal the eighth amendment, it is about trusting women and, crucially, trusting doctors. Again, our legislation is not built to trust doctors with how it seeks to criminalise and suppress those making decisions and the rigid definition of fatal foetal abnormalities. This has been a long time coming. We should not be here in 2026, eight years after the referendum and five years after the review should have been completed, still talking about just one part of the updating of our termination of pregnancy legislation. Eliminating the three-day wait needs to be the simple part of the conversation.”
“Neonatologists and obstetricians talk about the extreme difficulty of being able to predict with any great certainty, with regard to fatal foetal abnormalities, whether a baby will pass away within the 28-day limit. The Labour Party believes the 28-day limit has to be reviewed. I listened to a woman named Holly on Cork's 96 FM this morning who spoke eloquently and bravely about the loss of her daughter Hazel. She had been yearning for a baby, but the reality was when she was 14 weeks pregnant, there was a realisation that there was a fatal foetal abnormality. As there could not be certainty about whether it would happen within 28 days, she felt she had to travel. There will be many other families who want to stay the course and give birth to that baby in this country, but others will not. Again, this is about trusting women.”
“I have already said this legislation should be expedited - this legislation or the Government's legislation - after tomorrow night, when I hope it will pass. I implore all TDs on the Government benches to do the right thing, not to pass judgment on women but make sure they afford women the opportunity to do the thing that is best for them, their families and their bodies and not to pass judgment about what is right or wrong. I cannot let the occasion pass without talking about fatal foetal abnormalities, because I passionately believe that has to be part of the conversation. Unfortunately, it is not part of this legislation, but it is hugely important to the Labour Party. There are serious questions about the clinical indication with regard to the 28 days.”