Paul Murphy
Dublin South-West · People Before Profit-Solidarity · Ireland
“The Minister of State assured us we are bound by international law but then went on to talk about the fact that he wants to deploy troops outside the framework of international law. That is why the Government is getting rid of the triple lock. All the triple lock does is ensure that we only can send troops in line with international law.”
“The case for MetroLink south west is extremely strong. There are 350,000 people living between the Luas red and green lines. That is who will be served by this.”
“Hopefully the junior Minister will be able to clarify. The Minister, Deputy McEntee, said earlier to Deputy Ó Laoghaire, "The people I speak to do not like the fact that Russia has essentially removed, or will remove in the coming months, all our peacekeeping troops from UNIFIL".”
“I, too, want to ask about the senior Minister. This came up at the Dáil reform committee last week. It is very peculiar that a senior Minister is here and has answered previous questions on the triple lock today and then – no offence meant - we have the junior Minister answering these questions, which precisely prevents the continuation o…”
“Its defence is that we should not worry because the Government is only going to send them as part of an international force. I do not think anyone here thinks the Government is going to invade a country all by itself.”
“It is there in black and white in the programme for Government and the Government needs to live up to its commitment to do a new, properly independent feasibility study. I appeal to the Minister of State to ask the Minister for Transport to meet with the metro south west group which has been doing such excellent campaigning on this issue.”
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“I thank the Minister of State. We are in a deep climate crisis and we are missing our sectoral emissions targets with regard to transport, as well as our targets as a whole, by a very wide margin. We are in a cost-of-living crisis. An immediate answer to both of those is investment in public transport. Yet, what the Government is doing is delaying investment in necessary public transport projects. I will quote from the Climate Change Advisory Council review: ... under the current National Development Plan ... DART+ South West construction will not commence until post 2030 and construction of Luas Finglas ... will not commence until 2029. The delays in construction for these shovel-ready projects are unnecessary.”
“My question to the Minister is on whether he is going to seek additional investment in public transport in light of the fuel crisis. Two days ago, the Minister got the Climate Change Advisory Council's annual review of transport. It is pretty damning as an assessment in that, already, the sectoral emissions ceiling has been exceeded. The 2025 one is projected to exceed the second one. The report also calls for investment to be expedited in a range of public transport infrastructure projects. Will the Minister go along with that?”
“There need to be measures to address the deep poverty that disabled people are sinking into. The figures are going to be worse reflecting this year's budget. I stress very strongly that this needs to be done as soon as possible, and it needs to be included in the budget.”
“The tough choices I am in favour of the Government making are putting a levy on data centres, putting a wealth tax on the multimillionaires and increasing corporation tax. They are the tough choices that we make in our budget proposals on an annual basis and in which we included a cost-of-disability payment for a number of years. They are better tough choices than forcing disabled people to live in poverty. The Minister is saying that it will not be the end of June or early July any more. I presume he accepts that that is a very tight timeframe for a concrete proposal to make its way into a budget. The Minister made the point, and the point was made at the conference, that the cost would not be insignificant if a universal payment was introduced, which we support. This needs to be in the budget.”
“It does seem to me that the timeframe is very tight in terms of this actually being delivered for budget 2027. Disabled people cannot be asked to wait again for another budget, which I worry we are on track for.”
“I do not question that the Minister knows the real impact of having a disability, and he knows the figures. He stated at the conference that the additional cost for households with a disabled person is up to €555 a week. I am sure the Minister knows that the official risk of poverty rates are 32.5%. When we take into account the cost of disability, however, this rises to over 65%, which is obviously immense. The issue is whether the Government is going to deliver on what it said in the context of the uproar, rightly, about the budget last year and that we were going to introduce this. The Minister told the conference he would bring a concrete proposal on a new cost-of-disability payment to the Department by the end of June. The Minister did not repeat that commitment in his answer here. I wonder will the Minister repeat it now.”
“This question relates to the cost-of-disability payment. Obviously, a big political issue over the past six months was the cut in the budget of €1,400-plus for disabled people and the call for emergency cost-of-living disability payments. In response, the Government stated that it is working on a cost-of-disability payment and is going to introduce it in budget 2027. The Minister had promised to bring forward a concrete proposal by the end of the month, but this has not appeared yet. Where is it? Will the Minister guarantee that it will be included in budget 2027?”
“This means privatising our electricity supply, enabling big tech to use fossil fuels indefinitely to power them and smashing through our climate targets. Despite the Government's bluster and despite the nonsense about almost 900,000 jobs, listening to the industry itself, it is clear that it employs about 1,800 people in this country. A giant empty box is coming for your job and the Government calls it progress.”
“Then we hear that funding for DART+ South West and Luas Finglas has been delayed until 2030. It does not take a genius to figure out why. There is no point in building the system if we cannot power it because data centres are using up all of the electricity. It is embarrassing enough for the Government not to be able to charge a few hundred buses but entire train and Luas lines would expose the Government's incompetence completely. At a meeting last week of the Oireachtas Committee on Artificial Intelligence, we heard that we have no chance of achieving our emissions target because of Government policy to allow unfettered expansion of data centres as long as they build their own power plants.”
“Data centres are the main reason that standing charges are being increased to fund investment in the grid, which they have completely maxed out in the greater Dublin area. The consequence is that housing developments are being stalled because they cannot connect to the grid, Dublin Bus has not been able to charge new electric buses for up to three years and vital public transport projects like DART+, MetroLink and Luas are being delayed as a consequence. The ESB has warned that MetroLink construction and further electrification of Dublin Bus will have to rely on "timed electricity connections" to avoid winter peak loads. A briefing note prepared for the Government's major project governance oversight group in April 2025 warned that there was insufficient power in the ESB network to support DART+.”
“Momentum is growing against data centres and the Government's slavish adherence to the policy on demands of big tech because more and more people are seeing the reality of the threats data centres pose to our environment, our energy supply and the cost of living. In our alternative budget last year, People Before Profit proposed a €1 billion energy levy on data centres to fund a €500 universal electricity credit. The effect would be to charge data centres roughly the same amount for electricity as households pay. At the moment, they pay half as much per unit as households do. On top of that, data centres are driving up electricity prices for everybody by pushing the system into peak rates more often through their constant insatiable demand for energy.”
“It is what the media committee, the AI committee and every expert recommends: clean up social media at source by turning off the toxic algorithms that big tech profits from.”
“I agree entirely. The Taoiseach has said that, "Social media is the public health issue of our time". It is nice that he has discovered it after voting against the Bill to ban recommender algorithms just a few months ago. However, does the Taoiseach think that this public health issue just stops as soon as people turn 16? Does he think that people are then suddenly immune to addictive design, to infinite scroll, to the manosphere and to pro-eating disorder content being spewed out at them? All of that will remain on social media if under-16s are barred from it because that is what is core to the big tech business model. We know from Australia that many under-16s find it easy to bypass the age verification. We cannot rely on it to keep our kids safe. The answer is very clear.”
“Eleven councillors signed a motion to call a special meeting to hear a section 140 motion to stop this rent increase going ahead until the previously unanimously agreed consultation would take place. Just yesterday, council management ruled that out. The motion is considered invalid and the request for a special meeting of the council is not being granted. One of the reasons the council is doing so is that it says the motion is effectively seeking to prevent the performance of a function which the chief executive is required by law to perform. The chief executive is not required to increase rents. Can the Taoiseach confirm that? Does he agree that the councillors should be allowed to meet and vote?”
“Has the Taoiseach had any discussion about local democracy with his European counterparts, and about the fact Ireland has the lowest levels of autonomy and local democracy in all of Europe? I will give the Taoiseach a dramatic illustration of this. I have raised before with him the attempt by South Dublin County Council to massively hike rents for 20,000 families - council tenants, housing assistance payment, HAP, tenants, homeless HAP tenants and approved housing body, AHB, tenants - at an average of €1,000. It is trying to do this without a vote. It was not included in the budget. Then it tried to say it was going to be implemented from 1 July, because it is an executive function and the council can just set it.”
“Is it okay that if you have private healthcare, you get to wait a lot less than if you have public healthcare? These are children. These are children who do not even make the choice about whether they have private healthcare or not. Does the Minister agree that all children need to be treated equally, regardless of their health insurance status? Does he agree the report needs to be published? Does he agree that it is time to wipe private healthcare out of CHI and the whole public hospital system?”
“The Minister's commitment to public healthcare is somewhat undermined by the fact that private suites are being built in the new national children's hospital right now - more inequality literally being built into the system even though private care in public hospitals is meant to be expiring. I will ask again whether the Minister agrees that this report needs to be published. People have the right to see these figures which show the reality of the horrific effect of having private for-profit healthcare happening within our health system. What it means is worse health outcomes, longer times on waiting lists - sometimes in agony - and having poor outcomes at the end of it for kids whose parents do not have the money to have private healthcare. Is that okay?”
“There was one case where a child waited seven years for routine surgery. The report points out that children may wait longer than clinically recommended for assessment, investigation or treatment, with potential consequences for clinical outcomes, disease progression and quality of life. So much for cherishing all the children of the nation equally. Does the Minister agree that this is utterly horrendous and that all children should get equal access to healthcare? Does he agree that this report needs to be published immediately? Does he agree that just as private healthcare has no place in the Rotunda, it should have no place in Children's Health Ireland either?”
“That is pretty much across the board in terms of a massive discrepancy of waiting time in public versus waiting time for private. Everyone pretends that discrimination between private and public patients has no impact on safety or patient care but the review shows that to be untrue. Let me quote from it: "For Spinal patients, only 41% (9 out of 22) were treated within the Clinical Recommended Timeframes ... meaning 59% faced delays, sometimes for several months. Delays happened for both urgent and less urgent cases ... with a median delay of 143 days". We all remember poor Harvey Morrison Sherratt suffering in agony on a waiting list. In urology, "Of the 73 patients reviewed ... (41%) were treated outside the Clinical Recommended Timeframes ... The median delay was 152 days".”
“Hospital consultants are prioritising private patients over those on public lists. It shows that children who need urology surgery are waiting up to a year longer if they do not have private health insurance. Kids who need time-sensitive spinal surgery are waiting more than six months longer because their little bodies are less profitable to operate on. I will give the Minister some examples from the report. Urology consultant 2 in this sample has 20 public child patients. The average waiting time for surgery in public is 12.4 months. For ten private patients the average waiting time is 1.84 months. For consultant 5, in orthopaedics, the average waiting time in public is 8.7 months while the average waiting time in private is two months.”
“The greed of Rotunda Hospital consultants on public-only contracts trying to get a way with still treating private patients in public hospitals has been front-page news all week. The Minister for Health has said she believes "in equality for every baby being born". The idea that some mothers and babies should get better care because of having more money is absolutely abhorrent but the question is: should that equality for babies stop the moment that they leave the maternity hospital? There is an unpublished report by EY into Children's Health Ireland, CHI, which shows that is exactly what is happening. It shows that children whose parents cannot afford health insurance, that is, approximately half of all children in this country, are being forced to wait much, much longer for essential surgery.”
“It is not to annoy Donald Trump and the US Administration too much. That is the bottom line. We know that 90 minutes after the US ambassador wrote to Micheál Martin saying the US had concerns about this Bill, Micheál Martin said the Bill was going to be reviewed rather than progressed. I think it is disgraceful. It is utterly disgraceful to prioritise relations with Donald Trump and US imperialism over standing up against genocide and apartheid. Public pressure is going to come to bear over the coming weeks to insist that we, at the very least, have a Bill that includes goods and services.”
“In 2018, in response to the original occupied territories Bill, the Minister said, "The first and essential reason [we cannot support it] is that the essential purpose of the Bill is contrary to EU law and requires the State to do something which is not in its power." The Minister said then that legally, we could not do goods or services - neither - but European law has not changed an iota since then. The European law in relation to trade is the same. What has changed is politics. What has changed is that the Minister is under pressure on this issue. It is all about politics. The Attorney General said it was about politics. In the leaked advice, the Attorney General said that the decision to replace the occupied territories Bill is "a political choice". What is the political choice?”
“The Government has been scratching around for some sort of legal justification to hang this upon. What it has come up with is the idea that the public policy exemption only applies to goods. I do not think the Minister believes it. I do not think she has any legal authority to base it upon because I presume she heard the evidence of expert after expert and eminent lawyer after eminent lawyer in the foreign affairs committee who said, one after the other, that public policy also provides a derogation not only for the free movement of goods but also the freedom to provide services. However, everybody knows it is not about law. The Minister knows it is not about law.”
“What this debate is about is the shameful decision of the Government to gut Senator Frances Black's occupied territories Bill by excluding services. It only took up a tiny fraction of the Minister's opening statement but everybody knows that is what this debate is about. It is about the Government's decision to ignore the unanimous position of the foreign affairs committee and this Dáil. It is about its decision to ignore the fact that Spain has implemented measures on services with no comeback and no legal action from the European Commission. It is about its decision to ignore the position and the decision of the International Court of Justice, which made no distinction between goods and services when it said that states must abstain from entering into economic or trade dealings with Israel concerning the occupied Palestinian territory.”
“These people, who are at the top of society and some of whom are rich and powerful, are happy to see people divided and to see hate and division spread to distract from their own failures that people in our society are paying for.”
“I want to condemn the horrific attack in Belfast on Monday night and commend those who bravely intervened. I also want to condemn what was effectively a racist pogrom in Belfast last night. The scenes and the stories of families having their homes burned down and being forced to flee out of burning homes by violent gangs were absolutely heartbreaking. It is grimly reminiscent of the pogroms in Belfast in the 1920s and the 1960s. The Taoiseach has rightly condemned those who set those homes alight. Will he also condemn those who fanned the flames online? I refer to the likes of Elon Musk, one of the richest, most powerful men in the world, Tommy Robinson, Conor McGregor and also those politicians who have engaged in the scapegoating of migrants.”
“If the school had pupils who were in it two years ago and who should be captured but who are now in a different school, it is not technically able to update their addresses because they are now registered elsewhere. Therefore, that is not being captured in the appeal and the school does not have a chance to put forward all these arguments. I think they have been submitted to the Minister of State in parliamentary questions in terms of the points about homeless hubs and IPAS so, hopefully, they can be taken into account.”
“We absolutely accept there need for objective criteria. That is not in doubt. The question is whether we have objective criteria that capture the reality beyond simply the geographical deprivation index. It is not entirely clear. I do not think a list of the criteria has been published - if a school is above this, it is in but if a school is below this, it is out. The school has appealed. There is a limit in the appeals process because the only basis on which the school could really appeal was to update the Primary Online Database about its pupils and then say it had done that. It obviously hopes that this is enough to put it over the line but there are flaws even there.”
“The school community is worried that it certainly was not captured at the first step and needs to be captured on appeal stage so that it gets DEIS plus status.”
“It is one of the largest DEIS band 1 schools in the country with 431 pupils. There are about 50 different nationalities represented. It is a really fantastic school and a great place for kids to learn but it definitely could do with the extra resources. One simple example is that in the area served by St. Dominic's is Tallaght village, which would not qualify as an area of particularly high deprivation. However, within this area, there is an IPAS centre and a homeless hub. Multiple children from both these places are going to the school. Many kids who are coming in are in homeless housing assistance payment, HAP, accommodation or are kids from lone parent families with high levels of intergenerational educational disadvantage.”
“Apologies from Deputy Crowe who supports this issue but cannot be here this morning. I welcome the DEIS plus scheme. It can make a real difference for children in school communities with high levels of educational disadvantage. The extra resources will make a real difference. There are other issues around the country but we are raising a particular issue regarding a school which is excluded from the current scheme. It has appealed that. It seems to highlight a flaw in the methodology which is primarily based, as far as I understand it, on the deprivation index. Therefore, it can miss the level of granularity which means that for some schools, the level of deprivation that was reflected in their school community is not fully captured by that data. St. Dominic's National School in Tallaght is one such school.”
“It is very clear about the circumstances where you can deploy troops abroad. You can do it in self defence or you can do it when there has been a resolution by the UN Security Council or the UN General Assembly. It is clear. That is precisely what the triple lock says. What I think the Minister wants to do is say that we adhere to international law but we do what we want and then we just say that it is in line with international law. When the US engages in its imperialist adventures around the world, it always says it is in line with international law. I think Putin claims that his invasion of Ukraine is in line with international law but there is a big difference.”
“I think the Minister is deliberately being a bit disingenuous by saying that, okay, this is agreed by legislation. She does not recognise the European referendums that enshrined this. We have the Seville declaration. It is part of international law. The Minister does not recognise that the people voted on this. That is forgetting about the recent presidential election where neutrality dominated the campaign. That is forgetting about all the opinion polls that show that people support neutrality and support the triple lock. The Minister might enlighten us then about the circumstances where she thinks it is legal to deploy soldiers abroad that do not have UN authorisation nonetheless are in the framework of international law? What is it that she is talking about? I cannot understand because the UN Charter is very clear.”
“Will it say that we will only send troops abroad in accordance with the articles of the UN Charter? The articles of the UN Charter are very clear. The Minister can send troops abroad in self-defence, which is not covered by the triple lock, or she can do it with a UN-authorised mission, which is precisely what the triple lock states. The triple lock enshrines in Irish law international law. It states that we can only send troops in accordance with international law. The only reason to get rid of it is if the Minister wants to send troops outside of the framework of international law.”
“There is something called international law. I will quote to the Minister what the Minister of State, Deputy Troy, said: "Ireland's position on the use of force where there is no UN mandate or authorisation is well established and known. For fear that anyone is in any doubt, let me be clear: it is wrong and it is illegal." Does the Minister agree with the Minister of State, Deputy Troy? All the triple lock does is ensure that we can only send troops where there is a UN mandate or authorisation. That is all it does. The Minister getting rid of the triple lock is about enabling her to send troops outside of the framework of international law. That is 100% what it is about. What is interesting is that the Minister speaks about how the new Bill is going to talk about the principles of the United Nations Charter.”
“This goes back again to the triple lock, this time on the international implications. I ask the Minister whether the new Bill would have allowed Ireland to participate in Trump's illegal war on Iran. We heard from a top civil servant, despite seeming objections from the Minister and her junior Minister at the committee, that if the triple lock was not there, Ireland could have participated in the invasion of Iraq. If the triple lock is gone, and if the Minister gets through with her Bill, will there be anything stopping her making Ireland join Trump's war in Iran?”
“It is because it is the only thing that stops this Government or any future Government from sending Irish troops to participate in any sort of imperialist intervention anywhere in the world. It is the only legal thing that stops them. At the committee, it was said that without the triple lock, Irish troops could have been sent to participate in the invasion of Iraq. That was said at the committee by the top civil servant. The Government allowed them to use Shannon Airport. If it were not for the triple lock, the Government could have sent Irish troops abroad. That is what the triple lock is about. I ask again whether the Minister of State agrees with what the Minister of State, Deputy Robert Troy, said.”
“The Minister of State claims he has a mandate. What does the Fianna Fáil manifesto say? It says it will continue to protect and promote Ireland's military neutrality, including sensible reform of the triple lock legislation. That is not what it is doing, is it? The triple lock is gone entirely. We look at the heads of Bill, which make it clear. The heads of Bill state that the Bill will provide for the removal of the triple lock. It is gone. Fianna Fáil does not have a mandate for this. We look at the presidential election, and we look at opinion poll after opinion poll. People are attached to neutrality, and they are not stupid. They know, just as Deputy Micheál Martin said, that the triple lock is at the core of our neutrality. Why?”
“Does the Minister of State agree with Deputy Troy or does he not? All the triple lock does is ensure that any mission we go on has a UN mandate or authorisation. That is the whole point of it. Why did Operation Irini not get extended by the UN? It is because it is no longer just about Libya. Let us be honest; it is about Russia. It is about chasing the Russian shadow fleet. Why on earth should Irish troops be chasing the Russian shadow fleet in the Mediterranean? That would be a breach of neutrality. It is perfectly correct that we are not going to be participating in that.”
“The idea that there has been any real public consultation here is a joke. Micheál Martin said we were going to have a citizens' assembly on neutrality. That was scrapped and replaced with a consultative forum packed with warmongers, NATO heads and academics with links to the military industrial complex. That was the Government's public consultation. What a joke. Allow the people to decide. Give the people a referendum. If the Government is so confident in its arguments, let us have it out and allow the people to decide. I will quote the Minister of State, Deputy Robert Troy. He said: Ireland's position on the use of force where there is no UN mandate or authorisation is well established and known. For fear that anyone is in any doubt, let me be clear: it is wrong and it is illegal.”
“The Minister wants to scrap the triple lock. She wants to be able to send Irish troops abroad on international missions outside of the framework of international law. She wants to be able to send Irish troops on NATO-led or US-led missions. That is her political position. I believe that equates to getting rid of neutrality but that is a question for the Minister. My question is whether she will allow the people to decide. Opinion poll after opinion poll has shown public support for neutrality and the triple lock. Will the Minister allow the people to decide on this question rather than making the decision herself?”
“His hatred for the people of Gaza is so well known that fans of his former club made up the chant of "He looks good, he looks fine, he hates Palestine". Shon Weissman is a forward who had a transfer to another club cancelled over his support for the genocide of Palestinians. He said that Israel should wipe Gaza off the map. Of course, we should not be playing these people. Ireland should be leading the way in isolating Israel on the world stage. That starts with stopping the game.”
“As for this idea that sport and politics have nothing to do with each other, look at what is happening in America right now where a Somalian referee has been refused access to referee the World Cup because of the racist policies of the US Government. An Iranian team are going to have to fly in and out to play games because of the murderous assault being rained down on them by the US and Israel. Football and sport are absolutely political. Let us not act like the members of the Israeli national team are some innocent civilians. Many of them are former IDF terrorists. It is even more insidious than that because many of them qualify for an exception as athletes but chose to join the IDF in any case. I will give two examples. Number 10, Manor Solomon, stated that Palestinians were killing their own people and blaming Israel.”
“What the Government needs to do is very simple. I find it astounding that there is an amendment from an opposition party tonight. Independent Ireland is calling for serious consideration to matches being played behind closed doors, thinking that somehow if we close the doors and play this genocidal team it somehow makes it okay. Let us be clear why there is mass support and calls for boycotting these games. It is because Israel has been committing a genocide for almost three years where it is likely that the death toll in reality is well over 100,000 people, where the vast majority of buildings in Gaza have been destroyed and where this is all continuing today. We know, in terms of the impact of sport, that 1,000 Palestinian athletes and over 560 footballers have been killed.”
“The Government response to public opinion, to the stop the game campaign and to the massive pressure it is now under is a continuation to its basic approach to the issue of Palestine. It is to have words. It is to hide. It is to engage in cowardice. In this case, it is to hide behind the FAI. The Minister for sport says he will personally not go to the game but then hides behind the FAI and refuses to take a clear position. What is needed from the Government is absolutely clear and it is what is being called for. The Government needs to make a clear statement about its opposition to playing the genocidal team of Israel, call for its exclusion from international sport and then it needs to say it is going to back up the FAI in that and ensure that grassroots football will not pay any price as a result of taking a principled position.”
“The reason the hauliers and transport operators are getting a bailout in this Bill is that they forced it out of the Government through militant protest. The lesson there for the trade union movement is that politely going into pay talks over and over and playing by the rules is getting it nowhere. The Government has proved it will only listen to militant protest. That is what workers need to do. They need to get organised into trade unions and they need to fight within those trade unions for militant action for above-inflation pay rates to ensure they are not left behind and put in a position of deeper and deeper deprivation as a consequence of the cost-of-living crisis.”
“The number being paid less than the minimum wage has gone up from 20%, or one in five in 2020, to 30%, or almost one in three young workers being legally paid less than the minimum wage. Now we have Fianna Fáil TDs talking about bypassing the Low Pay Commission altogether and using a different mechanism to set the minimum wage that gets rid of any benchmarking with the public sector or multinational pay rates. The only reason to do so is to keep the minimum wage artificially low in order that bosses can make even bigger profits. It is obvious from how this Government is treating workers that it thinks it can do whatever it wants and workers will not fight back. However, the fuel protests show that when people power takes it on, the Government is weak and can be forced to crumble very quickly and give concessions.”
“The Government placed a timed amendment of one year on it, the year passed and the Government said we needed to look into it. The Low Pay Commission looked into it, as did the ESRI, and it recommended that they be abolished. The Government then promised to look into it but then about a year ago, it said it was not going to do anything on it until 2029. It would not make a decision and we do not even have a commitment that it will abolish these incredible, exploitative subminimum wage rates in 2029. We just have a commitment that the Government is going to think about it in 2029. In the meantime, more and more employers are using subminimum pay rates as a loophole to avoid paying the minimum wage.”
“Another 20-year-old apprentice wrote to me to say: The lack of young lads and women going into trade is because of the terrible pay that every employer in Ireland's paying them. I'm looking to move out of home and buy or build a house but I can't afford to do so because I can't get a mortgage from the bank because I'm an apprentice and making far less than the minimum wage. The situation of young workers and apprentices sums up the cost-of-living crisis for many people in this country. Wages are far too low and the cost of living is far too high. What is the Government doing in response? The Low Pay Commission recommended abolishing subminimum wage rates for young workers back in March 2024. That was after we had proposed a Bill to abolish these rates for young workers in the Dáil. It passed Second Stage.”