Nessa Cosgrove
Labour Panel · Labour Party · Ireland
“The Minister of State recognised that there was a grassroots movement and the documentary "Groundswell" captured it. There is also the documentary "Gasland", which was made in America and came out in 2010. We know it is going to come from America. Again, this is the Trojan horse.”
“The amendment defines "fracked gas", which does not appear anywhere in the Bill. This, with amendment No. 13, would make clear that the importation of fracked gas would not be possible under the Bill. LNG particularly when sourced in the US, is usually derived from fracking.”
“I move amendment No. 3: In page 8, after line 39, to insert the following: " "hydraulically fractured gas" means liquefied natural gas, or natural gas in any other form, that has been produced, in whole or in part, by means of hydraulic fracturing within the meaning of section 5A of the Petroleum and Other Minerals Development Act 1960;".…”
“I am sorry but I just do not buy the argument that it is security. A floating LNG storage facility in Qatar was blown up. It is actually more of a risk to our security to have a floating LNG terminal. This whole thing is mad.”
“All of us were probably at the IFA briefing yesterday. When they gave us the briefing document I saw that it was exactly the same as the one last year and I wondered whether it had got anything it looked for. I was told not really, apart perhaps with regard to areas of natural constraint.”
“Historians, no doubt, are going to refer to this legislation in that way, because the reserve is not going to be used solely for emergencies. We are trying to define what an emergency is. There is no definition. Seven years ago, we led the way in the international community by committing to phase out oil and gas exploration.”
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“I welcome the Sinn Féin motion and I thank the party for bringing it forward. We all know very well the concerns about the cost of childcare and, as a parent of three children, I know they are very real. Childcare is an expensive business, and it should be. After all, we have highly qualified professional staff caring for our children, who are the most precious members of our society. This is not a service that can be delivered on the cheap and yet the system has been designed to deliver just that, a quality system on the cheap. It is delivered in the community sector through voluntary committees responsible for implementing increasingly complex and confusing schemes. In the private sector, it is done through the unpaid labour of small independent providers.”
“I would love to see us move to the living wage, but at this stage I hope we move to the national minimum wage. I add my support to an ability to borrow for the technical universities. I know there is a shortage of accommodation in the Atlantic Technological University, ATU, in Sligo, as there is across the country. That institution has worked closely with Sligo County Council and has secured a site. All it needs is the money.”
“His name was Ben Friel. I heard him on the radio speaking about some of the difficulties that he is facing in having to pay for tools. He said it is especially difficult for apprentices, who have to pay for tools and take into account the cost of accommodation and the cost of living. In a wealthy country at the moment, someone starting off, being paid a wage, trying to live away from home, trying to include travel costs and having to buy their own tools while earning €7.76 per hour is not acceptable. I do not know how anyone is supposed to live. Many people are taking on a second job. I would love support when I bring forward the Bill in December. I hope it will get cross-party support. It is not a huge ask that apprenticeships are included, at the very least, in the national minimum wage.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire. I will talk briefly about apprenticeships. The Minister said in his opening address that it is great to see much more investment in apprenticeships and further education and training, in particular. I worked for a time in Mayo, Sligo and Leitrim Education and Training Board, MSLETB, in a training centre so I can see the level of support that students are getting. My first Bill as a Senator relates to the inclusion of apprenticeships under the minimum wage. The Minister said in his opening address that there has been an uptake of 75% in apprenticeships since 2020. There has also been a drop-out rate of 20% in the past three years. A lot of this is due to on-the-job training. People are simply not able to afford to live. Someone addressed the committee for further education and training recently.”
“Pyrite, which happened on the east coast, is next and then pyrrhotite is the one that is at the very end, which is happening in Donegal. I do not think anyone realises the full extent of the crisis that is there. I thank the Minister of State for his time. We will look into this review and how to use it.”
“I thank the Minister of State for displaying a real interest in this. The non-demolition option is not working because, as I said earlier, if there is a defective block the deterioration can go into healthy blocks without people knowing. As such, demolition is the only option and this is what people want. Deputy Charles Ward got elected based on this, as did county councillors, because people feel they are not being listened to. I appreciate there is going to be a review. We have a model that works and that is what the homeowners want to see in Donegal. It is not just affecting homes but also early years centres and community centres. Whole communities are affected by this. It is a crisis and that needs to be homed in on. Deputy Mac Lochlainn said there were three levels to this. Mica, on this level, is like a cancer.”
“Between 20,000 and 30,000 homes have been negatively affected by defective concrete blocks in the north west. I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House. I urge him, the Minister and other Ministers of State in the Department to instruct their officials to carry out a full assessment of the challenges faced in Donegal and to empower the Housing Agency to provide an optimal end-to-end State-managed remediation model, like we saw in Leinster for pyrite, to relieve families of the financial and administrative burden of remediating their homes.”
“It was an end-to-end scheme delivered by the Housing Agency, which procured contractors, managed the work and paid the bills directly, with no upfront costs for homeowners. As has been seen in Donegal, at the moment it can cost between €700 and €1,000 to get an initial building assessment and several thousand euro to have inspections and tests carried out and reports written. These costs, along with the cost of a rebuild, are refunded if the work is approved, but homeowners have to come up with the cash first and the banks are not giving out loans because they know the houses are crumbling. This disaster has been described as being like a slow-moving earthquake and the response should be like a response to an earthquake. The crisis needs to be addressed as a whole and not as a series of individual misfortunes.”
“None of this is the fault of the affected homeowners. They bought or built their houses having faith in the system of regulations that are supposed to protect people, but the system failed. The danger is that it may continue to fail if this scheme is not addressed properly. Producers say these blocks meet the standard, but how can we have faith in those who are certifying them? Often quarries are certifying their own blocks. What steps is the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage taking to ensure quarries are adequately audited and that Government inspectors, not quarry owners or employees, seek material for inspection? The pyrite remediation scheme applied in Leinster provided the perfect model on which to build communities.”
“Science shows that deterioration can spread from defective blocks to seemingly healthy blocks, which have been left behind in walls or foundations and could be concealing a dark secret. Individuals, families and whole communities are experiencing significant distress, including high incidence of mental health issues among those affected. This was raised clearly by Deputy Charles Ward in his motion yesterday. According to a study done by Ulster University, 30% of affected homeowners have suicidal tendencies and 40% have severe depression. The importance of having a safe secure home cannot be overemphasised. I urge everyone to go to Donegal to see the absolutely devastating consequences. It is heartbreaking to see. People are sitting in their homes which are crumbling around them. Deputy Ward knows about this first hand.”
“I will speak about the amended scheme for remediation of defective blocks. Reliance is upon the standard IS 465 of 2018 which is unfit for purpose. It assesses superficial damage, not structural stability, and needs revision based on the best scientific evidence available on pyrrhotite sulfate attack. Engineers have downgraded recommendations for the full demolition of properties to partial demolition or remediation. We have heard from experts who say that partial demolition is a long-term disaster. We have seen one home of a pair of semi-detached houses demolished as defective while the other was left standing, despite displaying defects. We have seen houses partially demolished and reconstructed around walls which have not yet displayed signs of damage, and foundations are not included in the scheme.”
“Could we see an addendum put into the all-island rail review to review dealing exclusively with and positively discriminating in terms of the west and north west and that section of the railway? It is in public ownership and that section of the railway should be included in the review.”
“To ensure this, a suggestion for an easy initiative to improve customer experience is the reintroduction of the catering cart. It is an easy win. It is back on the Dublin-Cork train. It is back on the Dublin-Belfast train. I hope we will get it. It is something that could be delivered quite easily. To go on about the spine of Connacht, it is fantastic that the Athenry-Claremorris section has been committed to but, as Senators Mullen, Duffy and Collins said, we need it in the west of Ireland. We need this connectivity. The Minister of State will remember the wonderful song, "The West's Awake". Let the west be reawakened. Deputy Canney knows it because he lives there and he is a great advocate for it.”
“I would like to know if the Minister of State could clarify that. Is there going to be a move to an hourly service? A more urgent immediate ambition, and one which has been proven will work thanks to the great work of an engineering graduate of ATU Sligo - it is lucky that I am on the transport committee - is the delivery of an early morning commuter train from Longford to Sligo and possibly an evening return train. This would benefit students, workers, tourists and people attending medical appointments. No doubt some of my colleagues will probably raise this as well. I was reassured yesterday to hear on RTÉ radio Barry Kenny of Irish Rail say that he hoped in the relatively short term to be delivering this and that it does not want all the commuting to be focused on Dublin.”
“I can see in the railway review, because I spent a lot of time looking at it, that we have, on pages 103 to 105, a list of short-term, medium-term and long-term targets which set out potential projects which could be delivered by 2030, 2040 and 2050. The short-term targets in the review include introducing hourly services between Dublin and Belfast, Cork and Limerick, and Galway and Waterford. In terms of frequency, Sligo is relegated to an ambition of a two-hourly service. That is not a great level of ambition considering that the timetable is nearly two hours at present. It also directly contradicts exchanges that I have had with senior members of Irish Rail who have told me explicitly on two occasions that they are targeting a move to an hourly service within the next two years.”
“In terms of building capacity on the existing infrastructure between Sligo and Dublin - I use this train as I get it up every Tuesday and back every Thursday - the frequency, the length of the journey time and the capacity all need to be improved. I love the train. It is so comfortable. The Wi-Fi is really good on it. The plugs are really good on it. We have a lot of space. They are wonderful trains but we need more. We need more train lines and I suppose we need the catering cart - I will get to that in a second as well. We welcome the new carriages which came in last year and we are looking forward to receiving second-hand carriages when new ones come in on the east coast. To move pastures from road to rail, travel needs to be quicker and more efficient.”
“The title of the all-island rail review makes clear that the Border does not make sense in terms of rail infrastructure and the absence of railways makes our area of the nation more remote. The attention shown in the plan to improving the cross-Border offering in the east, with the Belfast-Dublin line, is only right and demonstrates the importance of rail in our network with our neighbours. In this spirit, I welcome the long-term reinstatement of a spur from Letterkenny to Derry as well as Portadown to Mullingar. However, the lack of attention, the absence of railway and the lack of ambition to build railway infrastructure is symptomatic of the neglect shown to the north west as a region as a whole.”
“North of Sligo and east of it, as far as the proposed line, there is a vast rail wilderness. There is a lack of hope if you look at Donegal, Cavan, north Sligo and north Leitrim. Recently, I visited the homestead of one of our heroes of the 1916 Rising, Seán Mac Diarmada, in Kiltyclogher. While Kiltyclogher feels remote today, the tour guide when we were there, who was wonderful, made the point that in 1915 Mac Diarmada made his way to Dublin from the local Glenfarne station, which was part of the Sligo, Leitrim and Northern Counties Railway. Glenfarne and Kiltyclogher did not feel remote in 1916. They were very much a central part of a united Ireland with a functioning rail network.”
“If they want to see me, they have to travel to Dublin, get the train from Heuston to Connolly and then go across to Sligo. We have an interest in rail. Build it and they will come. I will get to that concept in a second but first I want to describe what we feel in the north west. I compliment Dr. John Bradley of West on Track and his family. Dr. Bradley has worked so hard on this. The Minister of State is an advocate of his work. Dr. Bradley’s reports were dismissed but he has a huge legacy. The extension from Athenry to Claremorris is included in the plans, but would it not be brilliant if, before the next election, the line from Claremorris to Collooney were included, as Senator Mullen said? Donegal, north Leitrim, north Sligo and areas of the North of Ireland are completely devoid of rail.”
“I welcome the Minister of State. His being here again is a reflection of the interest we have in rail in the west. He knows this well himself. For once, I am not going to be talking about the western rail corridor. I will refer to it only at the very end. I have a picture to hand to show the significant rail gaps referred to in the all-Ireland rail review. The document recognises there are significant gaps in rail network coverage. There was never a truer word. Nothing grabs attention like a map. A picture paints a thousand words. From it, we can see the complete lack of provision in the north west. It is so obvious from the presence of all the Senators from the west how much they are interested in and need rail. My parents are both from Cork.”
“They have very generously turned their grief into action and have agreed to help the HSE to better train staff in assessing the needs of children with Down's syndrome or who are neurodivergent. The training programme in Cork used the letters of Kate's name: K for kind, A for alert, T for time and E for experts. I wanted to raise this because, like anyone who was listening to the show, I was touched by Kate's mother and the way she spoke about her daughter. I want to express my condolences to Claire and Matthew, and her brothers Matthew and Daniel, and the other members of her family. The loss of a child is a loss that no parent should endure. I hope their generosity of support will be enthusiastically taken up by the HSE.”
“One factor in this may be the way in which children with Down's syndrome or who are neurodivergent can present to doctors and health professionals when they are ill. They may react differently in a hospital environment or not demonstrate the same signs as other children who are seriously ill. Having different methods of triaging patients with additional needs is something that I have raised previously. Equality does not mean treating everyone identically. It means taking differences into to account to ensure an equal outcome. Kate's parents, Claire and Matthew, have talked about how her passing would not define their life. They remember Kate as being a fun-loving child who loved playschool, farming, chocolate buttons and jigsaws.”
“She was monitored as if she was suffering with a virus that would pass and was discharged from the hospital on the Thursday morning. She was readmitted early on the Friday morning, having been transported to the hospital by ambulance. Although the medical staff in Sligo University Hospital made a tremendous effort to save Kate's life, it was too late. Last week, an inquest ruled that her death occurred as a result of medical misadventure. The Coroner's Court found that the seriousness of her condition was missed when she was first admitted to hospital. I am raising this today after listening to the strength and positivity of Kate's mother, Claire, as I have raised in the Seanad before.”
“Anyone who was listening to Claire Byrne yesterday would have been struck by the very sad but uplifting story of Claire Colum from Strokestown in Roscommon. Ms Colum spoke about her daughter Kate, who was five years old when she died following a severe strep A infection on 31 March 2023. Kate had been admitted to Sligo University Hospital on the Wednesday of that week after she became very ill. Kate had Down's syndrome. She was a very robust little girl and it was unusual for her to be ill. Kate's parents knew something was wrong when they brought her to the hospital and placed their trust in the diagnosis by the medical staff that she had a nasty virus. She met all the criteria for a diagnosis of sepsis and should have been treated accordingly on the Wednesday. However, the opportunity was missed.”
“We know all the benefits of that, from friendships to developing confidence and social skills. The National Youth Council of Ireland, NYCI, has been looking for an extra €2.1 million and for an extra €2 million for existing capital infrastructure to upgrade facilities. It is unfortunate that, for youth services and other services on the ground, capital expenditure is very scarce and they are often just about making ends meet in the delivery of capital infrastructure. How will the increase in the budget support this? Under Project Ireland 2040, €7.55 billion will be invested in education. How much of that will be allocated to youth services? Can the Minister provide information on the uplift that youth organisations, both universal and targeted, can be expected to receive as a result of budget 2026?”
“That is all right. I know the feeling well. I second the amendment to the Order of Business by Senator Stephenson. I request that the Minister for education, Deputy McEntee, provide a breakdown of the €8 million allocated for youth work in the budget. As a former youth worker who worked for many years in the youth sector, I know first-hand how youth work changes lives. It has to be recognised that there is an €8 million increase on last year's budget, but it is only 13% of the increase the youth services being delivered across the country need to be sustainable. I would like to ask the Minister how this investment allows for the sustainability and expansion of youth services. They need €17.2 million to protect existing services. They want to expand services and get more young people involved.”
“The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, has hit out regarding the hospitality sector, saying the Government failed to heed the advice of the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council. It said 11,400 additional nurses could have been employed. I have no doubt Senator Noonan will speak about the basic income for artists scheme. It is so welcome but there was a cut to the arts budget. Will there be a play-off whereby artists will get a basic income, on the one hand, and money will be taken from other arts organisations, on the other?”
“There are too many stumbling blocks in the way. It is notoriously difficult to maintain. I do not know how anyone who wants to add an extension onto an existing business could do it. They would nearly need to employ consultants to be eligible for the grant. A mark of a country is how it treats its most vulnerable. Very welcome steps have been taken to address the acute shortage of beds in the north west. There has been a commitment to opening two surgical hubs, in Letterkenny University Hospital and Sligo University Hospital. However, there is a lack of step-down facilities in the north west. It emerged last week that a patient who was medically discharged from Sligo University Hospital had been there for two years because there were no community services for him.”
“It will bring a lot of derelict properties back into use, which is absolutely fantastic. However, there was nothing in the budget for owners of defective homes. There was no change to the defective blocks scheme and there is still not 100% redress. If anyone takes a trip to Donegal, they will see the devastating crisis that exists there. It is extending to every other county as well. I will speak briefly about childcare. During the election campaign, the Government parties were tripping over themselves to say there would be a big change in childcare. Senator Tully spoke about the building blocks scheme, which is a really good scheme but it has not been implemented or delivered. In my area, like every area across the country, people are crying out for it to be delivered but it has not been delivered.”
“The argument has always related to the amount of work provided by employers in small towns and villages. That is true, but we could have given targeted support to small cafés and restaurants by cutting commercial rates and introducing energy supports. That would be a lot better than giving a blanket reduction in the VAT rate to companies like Burger King and McDonald's, which definitely do not need it. There are some very welcome elements regarding housing in the budget. As a party, we have been calling for years for the derelict sites levy to be collected by Revenue. That change is brilliant and long overdue. The Government is finally putting some teeth into the scheme. I am delighted the living city initiative has been extended to my town, Sligo. That is really welcome.”
“Up to 200,000 people earn the minimum wage in Ireland, a group disproportionately made up of women, younger people and people with disabilities. Many of them work in the retail, hospitality and service industries. It is very hard for us to accept that minimum wage workers are being short-changed by up to €600 by the Government at a time when the labour market is thriving. It is great that the Government can brag about the fact that the labour market and the general economic environment have never been stronger. The National Youth Council of Ireland has criticised the lack of movement on the sub-minimum rates paid to younger people. I support that. The increase was also recommended by the Low Pay Commission. I know the VAT cut to the hospitality sector has been widely criticised. As a party, we were one of the first ones to criticise it.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. I thank her for providing her opening address. We all saw on "Prime Time" last night some of the real-life stories of some of the families impacted by this budget. Some are saying they are worse off. Today, I will talk about the minimum wage and the failure of the Government to move to a living wage. The delay in replacing the national minimum wage with a living wage will cost the country's lowest paid workers €600 a year. People who are struggling as it is will be less well-off by €600. Yesterday, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, confirmed that the minimum wage will increase by 65 cent in January, a rise of just under 5%, taking it from €13.50 to €14.65. This new rate will mean that over a 39-hour week, people's pay will go from €526 to €551.85, or an annual salary of €28,696.”
“It could have addressed structural inequalities. People will spend another year in the cold, worried and stressed about how they will pay their energy and food bills and, if they have somewhere, their rent.”
“We have the highest energy costs in Europe but the profiteering from the energy companies is going completely unaddressed. The Labour Party proposed extending the fuel allowance to all those on the working family payment and extending the payment period from 28 weeks to 32 weeks. We would do this by putting a 20% windfall tax on the profits of the energy companies. As I said, one in five children are living in poverty, and we could have seen a second tier of targeted child benefit in the budget. Why is the derelict property tax being delayed until 2028? We need apartments, and we all agree with this, but why will there be a VAT cut for developers with no link to affordability? The budget harks back to the days of the Galway tent. It is disappointing and it does not do anything. It definitely favours property developers and big businesses.”
“Once again, it was not listened to. Rather than this, we have tax breaks for food barons and developers. This money could have been used to target a child support payment to the poorest of families. Where are the promises that were made to carers coming up to the election? Carers save the State €20 billion a year. The Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael manifestoes made a commitment to get rid of this but there is only piecemeal progress. Why not get rid of it? The Disability Federation of Ireland has already come out today and called the budget a betrayal of disabled people. Where is the cost of disability payment that was spoken about? We can see that energy credits papered over the cracks in the previous budget but this year they could have been targeted.”
“The VAT cut being given to companies such as McDonald's and Supermacs would have been able to fund a second tier of child benefit. Families are getting no energy supports in the budget. They will see limited improvements in their childcare fees and will pay €500 more in college fees, which the Government has had the cheek to paint as a cut. The budget will really hurt those who depend on the State for their income. There is an extra €10 a week. We know our social welfare payments are targeted and an extra €10 a week will do nothing to help those families make ends meet while the prices of basic things are spiralling completely out of control. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul has said €16 needs to be added to every core weekly payment. Our party agrees with this and we have it in our alternative budget.”
“We have the second highest energy costs in Europe, skyrocketing food prices and a housing crisis that continues to spiral, with 5,000 children living in homelessness, but homelessness was never mentioned once today in the addresses by both Ministers. Where was the commitment to eradicate child poverty? One in five children in Ireland is living in poverty. Our public services need urgent investment. We have shown, as a party, how we would pay for them by raising revenue and restoring the bank levy to €500 million, but we are not listened to. This is another issue that we have raised today: we on the Opposition benches are not listened to. The Government has chosen to give a sweeping tax break to McDonald's and Supermacs rather than to ordinary people to support their needs. I am delighted that other parties have picked up on this.”
“This is my first year as an elected representative in the Houses of the Oireachtas and it is my first time hearing the budget. All that kept going through my head when I was sitting in the Dáil listening to the budget was the song “Here we go again". This budget is yet another in a long list of missed opportunities by the Government and its predecessors of recent years. We are over a decade into an unprecedented spell of uninterrupted growth, yet we have chronic deficits in infrastructure, transport, health, education and energy. As I have said before in the House, we are a very rich country but for too many people, it feels very poor. Where are the protections today for the vulnerable? Where are the protections for low- to middle-income earners in this budget?”
“Is it possible that the Government will try to introduce this Bill when we are distracted by the presidential campaign? Could we get clarification on the Government's intention to exclude trade in services in the occupied territories Bill? We need clarification on this urgently, given the level of public engagement on this issue. We deserve to know what the Government intends to do.”
“There are possible indications that the Government is going to ignore the recommendations of the foreign affairs committee and leave out a ban on trade in services from the Bill. The first was a speech of the Taoiseach, Deputy Micheál Martin, to the UN General Assembly last Friday, in which, when referring to Gaza, he said we are legislating against the importation of goods from the occupied territories, and he made no reference to banning trade in services. The second instance, which was highlighted to me by a constituent, was by a Government MEP who, in response to a letter, indicated that the Irish Government was preparing to pass the occupied territories Bill banning trade in goods from Palestinian land illegally occupied by Israel, following the example of Slovenia and Spain. I want clarification.”
“I will not speak about the budget as I will wait until the statements later today. I want to put a different issue before the Leader. The long-awaited occupied territories Bill will be coming before the Dáil for a vote soon. We know the foreign affairs joint committee strongly recommends progressing the Bill and that the prohibition of imports from the Palestinian occupied territories should be extended to include trade in services, in line with the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice and the resolution that Ireland co-sponsored at the United Nations General Assembly. Last week, I saw there was a case for alarm. I want to make sure we get clarification around it so that it does not get lost between the budget and the presidential election.”
“We still have a week to go before the budget is announced so I hope that will be something that can be looked at again to bring in a ban on evicting children into homelessness.”
“It is welcome to hear there will be targeted measures. It is unfortunate there will not be a second tier of child benefit in this budget. It comes back to the real issue about homelessness. We know it from all around the country. A ban on evicting could be introduced quickly and easily which would stop the eviction of a family who has received a notice to quit until social housing is built. I acknowledge the commitment to build more social housing but, in the meantime, children are being evicted into homelessness and we know the impact of that will live with them for the rest of their lives. I am disappointed to hear that this issue cannot be addressed in this budget but I appreciate the Minister coming in.”
“I ask for clarification on the commitments to protect children that go beyond the provision of school meals. I raised this on the Order of Business last week. School meals are really welcome but they are not enough. If a child is living in poverty now, what will that mean for his or her future? I want to know the exact steps that are coming in the budget.”
“Children living in damp and cold homes cannot thrive and suffer increased levels of ill health which will be with them for the rest of their lives. Electricity bills have risen by 69% and gas bills by 102% since January 2021. These are staggering increases but inflation figures, whether in food or energy, do not tell the true story of families living in poverty. The choice between heating your home and eating is stark. No child should be homeless yet 5,000 children are homeless currently. In the forthcoming budget, what real steps will be included to eradicate child poverty? Will there be a policy or strategy to eradicate child poverty? We, as a party, are calling for an outright ban on evictions where children are involved. That is not something that cannot be asked. There should be no way for children to be evicted into homelessness.”
“According to the CSO, general inflation is under control but food inflation continues to grow at a rate of almost 5%, with the price of staples essential for a child’s development and growth, such as milk, eggs and beef, increasing rapidly. Nobody doing their weekly shop can have avoided noticing their increasing bills. Two years ago, Barnardos reported that 24% of parents borrowed money just to feed a child, 12% use a food bank and 41% - nearly half – of parents skipped or reduced their own meals to feed a child. Going to school hungry and going to bed hungry are realities which seem to have become normal, even acceptable, to some. They are not normal, they will never be normal and they will never be acceptable. Around 300,000 electricity customers are now in arrears, many of them families with children.”
“We all know there are children all over the country who are hungry, cold and living with a real fear of eviction. There are large numbers of families who feel real despair about their futures. The Labour Party raised a motion on this in the Dáil last week. I want to hear what the Minister and his Department are prioritising to challenge and eradicate the three aspects of child poverty. According to the ESRI, one in five children now lives below the poverty line once housing costs are factored in, which is a shocking statistic for a country as rich as ours. A survey carried out at the end of 2024 found that almost half of teachers believed that more children than ever before were coming to school hungry and that the direct cause of this hunger is the cost-of-living crisis.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire. I thank the Minister for coming in. The Taoiseach has been quoted as saying child poverty will be prioritised in the forthcoming budget. This is so welcome. We are all looking forward to hearing the budget. It has been widely reported that the latest ESRI report said that in 2025 Irish children are suffering the highest income poverty rates of all age groups. I do not need to tell the Minister that child poverty and homelessness affects all aspects of life - health, well-being, education and future careers. Children who experience poverty or homelessness are more likely to be poor or homeless as adults. There are three particular aspects which I want to address today. The first is childhood hunger or food poverty, the second is fuel poverty and the third is homelessness.”
“Carbon leakage is defined by the Act as "the transfer, due to climate policies, of production to other countries with less restrictive policies with regard to greenhouse gas emissions". We cannot allow the export of our climate responsibilities to South America to facilitate the importation of cheap beef. Farmers and the rural communities they sustain are the backbone of our country. I know there are many farmers here and they are the stewards of our environment. They, and not cheap imports of Brazilian beef, are the guarantors of food safety and food security. They will help us to reach our carbon emissions targets.”
“Beef can be produced cheaper and in greater quantity there than it can be here. It can also be produced without any regard to environmental standards. Beef production in South America is responsible for 65% of tropical deforestation. It would be utter hypocrisy to impose environmental standards and nature restoration requirements on Irish farmers while allowing the importation of beef from South America at the same time. I would like the Minister of State to confirm whether a carbon leakage assessment has been carried out against the implementation of the Mercosur deal. A carbon leakage assessment is required under the 2021 climate Act before any policy can be implemented.”