Matt Carthy
Cavan-Monaghan · Sinn Féin · Ireland
“I move amendment No. 1: To insert after "on 2nd July, 2026": "and: further calls on the Government to provide that the Accommodation Recognition Payment (ARP) scheme shall apply only to: — existing recipients with respect to the beneficiaries of temporary protection currently benefitting from the scheme where those beneficiaries of tempor…”
“10 reads, "In page 5, line 31, after “section 2” to insert “or section 3”." Section 3 criminalises recording, sharing or publishing an intimate image without consent where it seriously interferes with a person's privacy or causes alarm, distress or harm to them.”
“In terms of the legislation, as well as the breadth of the issues covered in the Bill, the other problem is the number of amendments the Minister has introduced on every Stage on new and unrelated matters that just have not been discussed in this House at all and will not get discussed here because of guillotines being applied and the Min…”
“It is not an additional punishment to be included on the register. As has been said, this is just about having a mechanism whereby the constitutional diktat that justice should be done in public is actually made available. This is not an additional punishment. It is actually a protection for others.”
“We must bear in mind that the vast majority of domestic violence offences and abuses never make their way to court. Most of them never result in a complaint. When complaints are made, most of them never see a file being sent to the DPP. Even when that happens, most of them never actually make it to court.”
“She made the point that when a woman, in the majority cases we are talking about women, goes to a Garda station to make a complaint about domestic violence you can virtually bet your life that it is not the first instance of domestic violence that she has encountered.”
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“Earlier today, Sinn Féin met the family of Joe Drennan. Joe was killed in a hit-and-run in October 2023. The man who killed Joe had 46 previous convictions. He was on bail at the time and was banned from driving. That night, he drove a BMW at top speed, broke a red light, smashed a car so fast that even after the back wheel had come off, the car continued to proceed to smash into Joe, robbing him of his young life. That man then got out, wiped down the car and ran away like a coward. Shockingly, he will not serve a single day for killing Joe as the sentence is to run concurrently with a separate firearms conviction. Does the Minister agree that the criminal justice system in this case has failed Joe Drennan and his family? Will the Government act in response?”
“The reality is that no explanation can excuse a position that is clearly contrary to the letter and spirit of international law and the ICJ determinations. Our strength as a neutral state with an independent foreign policy must be our consistency in upholding the principles of international law and the UN Charter. That consistency is required now more than ever, regardless of who is in the White House or the position of other EU states. We must speak up. We must act. We must sanction Israel. We must pass this motion.”
“Tonight, I appeal to Deputies of every party and none across the breadth of this House, if not for the beleaguered, displaced, maimed, orphaned and ethnically cleansed Palestinian people, if not for the tens of thousands murdered who will never know a ceasefire, let alone enjoy lasting peace, then for yourselves and your own legacy, because decades from now, every Member of this Parliament will claim to have done everything they could. Tonight, we can prove it. We can reject the Government amendment which, make no mistake about it, is a tool to delay and reduce the provisions of the occupied territories Bill. I hope the Tánaiste will explain why his amendment, like Government statements of the past couple of weeks, continually removes references to services and limits potential trade restrictions to goods.”
“Today, as Mary-Lou McDonald has just said, there is not a single person in this Chamber who would not denounce the apartheid-era regime of South Africa. I am too young to recall most of it, but I expect there is not a single person among the great and good of today who would not claim to have opposed apartheid in South Africa and to have advocated against it, but we know that was not truly the case. There were those who equivocated, frustrated and delayed meaningful action against the apartheid regime.”
“The Taoiseach and leader of Fianna Fáil, Micheál Martin, told an Oireachtas foreign affairs committee meeting I was at that the ICJ ruling was "an authoritative statement of applicable international law, which is binding on all states and international organisations". The Tánaiste and leader of Fine Gael, who is here, told the nation during a general election television debate that he would support the occupied territories Bill, not a watered-down version of it. What has changed since that? Any commitments to uphold international law seem to be just rhetorical devices to be used when seeking a mandate from the people and to be discarded when they actually really count. There have been six years of moments when this could have been progressed.”
“The ICJ further found that all states are under an obligation not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by Israel's illegal presence in the occupied Palestinian territory. That is as clear-cut as international law gets. Ireland should not be engaged in trade, either through goods or services, that supports Israel's illegal occupation. It is as simple as that. To do otherwise is to be complicit in Israel's breaches of international law and to economically support its occupation, apartheid and, unfortunately, its genocide. As has been said, the leaders of both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael committed to supporting the occupied territories Bill in advance of the recent general election.”
“Since then, we have borne witness to a genocide in which the latest toll of those murdered stands at 61,800, including at least 12,000 women, almost 18,000 children and 808 under the age of 12 months. Since then, the International Court of Justice has ruled on the legal consequences and implications of Israel's occupation. The ICJ has ruled that states have a duty to abstain from entering into economic or trade dealings with Israel concerning the occupied Palestinian territory or parts thereof which may entrench its unlawful presence in the territory. It also said that states must take steps to prevent trade or investment relations that assist in the maintenance of the illegal situation created by Israel in the occupied Palestinian territory.”
“I say if this is not the time to act, when will that time come?" When will that time come, indeed? What has changed since? Fianna Fáil entered government and essentially adopted the language and critique of the Bill that had been articulated by Fine Gael when it opposed the original iteration of the occupied territories Bill. What has happened since has been an escalation of the misery and suffering. The year 2022 went on to be the deadliest year on record for children in the West Bank. Thirty-four were killed. The year 2023 surpassed that record. Long before the horrendous actions of 7 October, Israel had killed 39 Palestinian children by mid-September.”
“When Donald Trump stood yesterday and declared he wanted to essentially ethnically cleanse Palestinian land, forcibly transfer tens of thousands of innocent Palestinians from their homeland, replace them with others and essentially create a new society, many people were shocked, except that is essentially the story of Palestine for the past century. The Palestinian story is a story of displacement and confiscation, of international law rendered meaningless, of suffering and of misery. It has continued because the world has never said stop. Introducing the occupied territories Bill to the Dáil in 2019, Fianna Fáil TD Niall Collins, now a junior minister in this Government, righteously challenged anyone who detracted from it. He said, "To those who have tried to dissuade us from supporting the Bill ...”
“I am disappointed that the forestry Minister did not even mention it. The network has to be resilient. That means planning for the generation ahead and considering undergrounding lines when possible. This should obviously start with new lines. The North-South interconnector, for example, should and must be undergrounded. We should never again have a situation where people are denied water because water treatment plants do not have standby generators. Those generators should be sourced and provided to every public and group water scheme right now. Generators should also be sourced for group homes, including for people with disabilities, and for schools and other essential public buildings, especially in areas that are at most high risk of future blackouts. In my constituency of Cavan-Monaghan, hundreds of families are still without power.”
“As households are compensated for power loss of more than 48 hours under the Scottish scheme, there is a clear incentive for energy companies to ensure that the transmission network is maintained. Forestry, some of which is planted by vulture funds, often brings minimal value to communities. Much of it is not native. Logging trucks are taking a toll on local roads. The only thing that some communities say they get from forestry are prolonged blackouts and power cuts. The forestry sector must also be held to account to ensure that it is not putting the electricity transmission network at risk. The call by farmers for a scheme to remove trees affected by ash dieback disease was never heeded. We paid a heavy price for that as many of the fallen lines were as a result of those trees. That scheme should be in place within a month.”
“The loss of mobile phone connectivity caused real difficulties leaving many vulnerable people isolated. Hard-pressed families should not be out of pocket as a result of a situation like this. We know that those who can afford it have spent money on generators, hot food and, in some cases, even alternative accommodation. While access to the immediate needs form without a means test is welcome, it is not enough. The automatic compensation scheme that is in place in Scotland should be considered. Under the Scottish system, households get approximately €1,000 if their power is gone for a week. Here, households are expected to pay the standing charge for a period when they were without power. The ESB, one of the most profitable companies in this country, has suggested it might even hike up prices further as a result of the storm.”
“There need to be better contingency plans for supporting people when something like this occurs. I commend all those community and volunteer groups, including GAA clubs and others, which picked up the pieces and put in place facilities such as charging, showers and hot drinks, but as we face into more frequent and stronger storms due to climate change we have to be better prepared. We have taxed people with carbon taxes to push them to get electric cars, to stop burning turf and to get rid of solid fuel stoves only for them to be totally reliant on electricity that some have now been without for 12 days. There needs to be significant investment in the upkeep of our electricity transmission network. We need backup plans for essential services. Communications are crucial.”
“Once all services have been restored, the priority must be to ensure that we have no repeat of this situation. There is real anger from some sections of our communities. The extent to which phone signal, electricity and water was lost was unprecedented but the real issue is the length of time people were left without those essential services. People feel let down and forgotten because many of the regions worst-affected have never been a priority for the Government. If the worst-affected areas were in Dún Laoghaire and Howth rather than Aghnamullen and Raferagh, I have no doubt that this Dáil would have sat last week. As well as homes, the prolonged outages in the aftermath of the storm have had a huge impact on businesses, schools and other essential services. Lessons need to be learned.”
“I commend those who helped individuals, families and communities following the devastation of Storm Éowyn. These include workers from the ESB, Uisce Éireann, local authorities and phone companies, those local businesses that stood up to the mark to support their communities, the farmers who cleared roads, and those communities that stood together, opened their halls and ensured that assistance was given where and when it was needed. In many respects, we saw the best of Ireland and the Irish people over the past two weeks. However, a lot of lessons will have to be learned following the storm. Communities, especially across the Border and in western counties such as Monaghan and Cavan, simply will not tolerate any repeat of the situation that we have experienced over recent times.”
“It is not good enough. The two boys there got 42% of the vote but that does not give them the right to run roughshod over 100 years of precedent - every single precedent of the Oireachtas. It is not good enough.”
“-----to let us know why he is facilitating this charade and why the Deputy beside him is. Maybe he should get an opportunity to tell the Dáil why he is going to support an increase in carbon taxes for the next five years, thereby increasing costs for people driving to work and heating their homes and for farmers, and then pretending that he is in the Opposition-----”