Peadar Tóibín
Meath West · Aontú · Ireland
“Lonely Planet. It did a review of Dublin and stated, "Once Dublin’s grand boulevard, O'Connell St has struggled with decline". It stated that vacant buildings, derelict upper floors and long-stalled redevelopments leave this part looking neglected while retail has shifted elsewhere and been replaced by fast food shops that dilute its char…”
“The Irish people are a generous and decent people and have been over the past number of years, with the provision of supports to people from Ukraine who are fleeing the war. This is right and just. The war unleashed on Ukraine is absolutely wrong. Aontú will support the reduction in the rate of payment under the scheme.”
“I am very disappointed to see that the Government, the Social Democrats, the Labour Party, the Green Party and People Before Profit will vote against an amendment that wants to means test the payment, as an amendment also did on the previous occasion, and put it on a level footing with other housing assistance payments.”
“Landlords are rational and they will make economic decisions to best suit themselves. Landlords have been more inclined to take on Ukrainian tenants over Irish tenants in recent years. This system is discriminatory. It gives an advantage to guests in the country over the people who have lived here for most of their lives.”
“Anyone who sat the leaving certificate economics paper just a few weeks ago will know that demand also has a role. It determines what rents are, the price of houses, etc. It is physics and maths and not ideology. We need to get to a situation where we equalise supply with demand.”
“A global study by TomTom indicated that it is the 38th most congested city globally, behind cities such as London, Toronto and Rome. The task force indicated that the Cork Luas system would be built. That Luas system is in planning and that planning is taking a long while.”
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“The recent legacy Bill is the son and heir of that cover-up and, in fact, the British have their fingerprints all over that Bill. The new iteration of that Bill is extremely problematic as well because it still allows for the British Secretary of State for the North of Ireland to prevent the holding of investigations and inquiries. The Secretary of State for the North of Ireland has previous on this. He has fought the family of Sean Brown in all the courts of the land in Britain to prevent them from having a proper investigation into the murder of their father. It is incumbent on this Government that it does not allow the British to pass a law whereby a politician determines whether an investigation can be had. The Minister or I should not have an opportunity for an investigation concerning ourselves be determined by a politician.”
“Interestingly, in that same year, 2023, the former Minister for justice Charlie Flanagan commented in relation to the Omagh bombing that the Republic should have a parallel inquiry into that atrocity and that the public need to be able to see vital evidence held in this State given over to allow for the truth to be known. Victims and survivors are entitled to know who did what and who was responsible for what. If this Aontú Bill were to pass, it would institute an investigation into what happened. We know that the British state forces had a role in so many killings and so much loss of life in Ireland, North and South, and many of those cases were covered up. They were covered up at the time but the British state distanced itself from that cover-up.”
“In 2023 Aontú introduced the Commission of Investigation (Collusion of British State Forces) Bill to provide for public inquiries into collusion between British state forces and other groups and individuals between 1968 and 1998. It passed First Stage in the Dáil. If the Bill were to pass all Stages, it would see an inquiry constituted in this State to investigate the British state either where it committed murder or if it assisted in the committing of murder or prevented prosecution in certain serious offences in Ireland, North and South.”
“We need to focus on the bigger issue of the unresolved investigations where families are searching for truth and justice and have been refused them for many years. We have to look at how we can resolve this on this side of the Border. For years and years the British Government has refused to tell the truth, refused to give evidence, protected informants, protected collusion and refused to let information be known about what happened under its authority. However, we should not let that paralyse us in terms of the actions we need to take in this State. We need to create structures ourselves for all-Ireland investigations and public inquiries. Atrocities and wrongdoings do not recognise the Border; they need an all-Ireland approach. The Border is actually a competitive advantage for the perpetrators of these killings.”
“It allows a specific legal mechanism to facilitate the taking of sworn testimony from State bodies and former ministerial officeholders before a judge in the High Court. It is modelled on the Criminal Justice (International Co-operation) Act 2019, which allowed oral testimony to be heard for the purposes of Troubles-related inquests outside of the State. Family members and survivors and their legal representatives will be allowed to attend as regards the evidence given before a High Court judge, and the Bill will allow for counsel to the inquiry to ask questions to clarify evidence given by a witness to the judge. There is a bigger truth we need to focus on as well, welcome and all as this Bill is.”
“Were there political reasons for not stopping the bomb going ahead? It is also incredible that the wheels of justice are so slow in grinding forward. It has been 28 years since that bomb ripped through Omagh. I remember that in 2021 Micheál Martin said he would consider if the South could facilitate information being disclosed and evidence being taken in the South of Ireland. That is five years ago. It has been five years since the Taoiseach made that statement, and it has taken that time to get the necessary legislation in front of us. I welcome this Bill and the Minister's role in making it happen, but it has taken an age for it to happen. The Bill allows for oral testimony to be taken before the Irish courts for the purpose of the Omagh bombing inquiry.”
“Catholics, Protestants, Spanish tourists, southerners, women and children, nationalists and unionists were all killed on that day. In 2013 a legal case started to try to understand if it was possible for the security forces to have prevented the Omagh bomb. Five years ago, in 2021, Mr. Justice Mark Horner at the Belfast High Court stated that there was a "real prospect" that the 1998 Omagh bomb could have been prevented by the security forces. That is an earth-shattering sentence for a judge to say. The idea that a corporate decision was possibly made by the British security forces to allow the bomb to proceed is deeply shocking. Did the British security service prioritise the protecting of informants over the protecting of citizens? Was there a failure to connect intelligence?”
“The Omagh bomb was the deadliest atrocity of the Troubles in the North of Ireland. It was second only to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, which killed more people in the seventies. On 15 August 1998 the Real IRA, a group opposed to the IRA ceasefire and to the Good Friday Agreement, killed 31 people, including two unborn children, and injured 220 others. Confused telephone warnings were made which did not specify the location of the bomb, and the police mistakenly moved people towards its location. The Real IRA denied that the bomb was intended to kill civilians and apologised, but this has to be one of the most damning and reckless actions ever to have taken place during the Troubles. The victims included people of all ages and backgrounds.”
“We have brought numerous crises to this Chamber over the past five years in relation to Tusla, and different Ministers for children have said they did not know about those situations at all. We recently submitted parliamentary questions about a young girl of 14 who was put in a placement in Tusla and who was taken by a criminal gang and found a year later in a brothel. The Garda will not tell us whether charges have been brought, whether someone has gone to court in relation to that or whether someone has been imprisoned for it. The Department is putting adults in children's accommodation. We had a shocking situation where Vadym Davydenko was murdered - killed - in children's accommodation by an individual who is now believed to have been an adult at the time.”
“We have reports of children living in filth, sleeping on urine-stained mattresses and being left without food in the house and, in some cases, staff who are meant to be in charge of them sleeping until 4 o'clock in the day. There is substantial expenditure in this space. In 2024, the Department spent €270 million on special emergency arrangements. Despite that investment, there are no proper standards for these children. The number of children put in these arrangements has doubled since 2023. One of the biggest problems I have is that when there is a crisis in housing, the Minister for housing is made responsible, and when there is a crisis in health, the Minister for Health is made responsible, but when there is a crisis in relation to the deaths of children in State care, Tusla is responsible and the Minister is not responsible at all.”
“That is the Minister's fault. It is unacceptable that children are being left with individuals who have not had background checks. Tusla has cut its monitoring visits by more than half at a time when the number of children in these locations is increasing significantly. The number of children in special emergency arrangements is going up; monitoring visits are being cut at the same time. Recent RTÉ reports have pulled back the curtains on this nightmare and have shown that children are being moved like cargo from hotels and bed and breakfast accommodation, sometimes with just a few hours' notice, and that these facilities lack proper oversight and fail to meet the State's duty of care. This has created major instability in these children's lives and made them vulnerable to danger, and the scale of this is increasing.”
“The fact that this is allowed to continue is a disgrace. It is shocking that the Government is still relying on special emergency arrangements. In 2023, I raised the issue of unvetted staff in these SEAs and the Minister at the time assured me that all staff were vetted. Now, in 2026, it has been revealed that Tusla was forced to terminate contracts with multiple staff members as it was disclosed that they had been working with vulnerable children without having been vetted. That is not a clinical error or some kind of bureaucratic mess; it is a fundamental breach of child safety laws. Under the Minister's tenure, there is no accountability for it whatsoever. Tusla has referred five private providers to the Garda National Vetting Bureau because they put staff in charge of children without proper background checks.”
“She was discharged from CAMHS after a mere two appointments and her body was found a few weeks later. She was aged 14. I recently submitted parliamentary questions about trafficking. The Department admits that there is no mechanism to cross-reference children flagged as at risk of trafficking with those who are missing from care. That is a dereliction of duty. The responses to parliamentary questions submitted by Aontú in the last few weeks show an increase in child trafficking in this State from ten minors in 2024 to 18 minors in 2025, an 80% increase just in the space of one year. I know for a fact that that is just the tip of the iceberg because this country is really poor at following up on people trafficking. One of the biggest disasters of this Government has been the use of special emergency arrangements, SEAs.”
“While this is happening in our generation, it is not focused on properly by the Government. Obviously, there are problems in Tusla, but many of the organisations that are also responsible for the welfare of children are not working seamlessly with those children. For example, Hugh was 16 when he died from a drug overdose after the child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, would not take him. Niamh, another child under Tusla's care, died by suicide aged 15. She had also been deemed ineligible by CAMHS. Another report on a girl called Eva under Tusla's care showed that she had disclosed sexual abuse but nobody from Tusla spoke to her because the Tusla area she was in assumed that the social worker in another area was dealing with the particular case.”
“Some of these cases have been incredible. In the first eight weeks of this year, five children in State care or known to the State services have died, which is shocking. One of those children was killed. One child died by suicide. Another child died in an accident and two children's deaths are still unexplained. In the last decade, the level of violence shown to children in State care is incredible. Thirteen children have been murdered and 38 children have died as result of suicide. These are horrific figures that should make any Government and any Dáil stand up in shock and seek to resolve. However, this shocking situation is seldom spoken about in Leinster House. It seldom gets to the front pages of the newspapers or the main headlines in the broadcast news.”
“I thank Independent Ireland for putting this motion to the House today. This is a very serious issue and one that we in Aontú have raised over and over again in this Chamber for many years. We believe that vulnerable children are being exposed to shocking danger by this Government and by a broken system over which the Minister presides. The figures speak for themselves. The national review panel presents incredible figures. It has indicated that between 2014 and February 2026, a total of 235 children died either in State care or known to State care services. That is a colossal human tragedy happening in real time. In the Dáil, we often talk about the horror and the shocking situations that happened in the past, but this one is happening in our generation and is one that we, in this Dáil, are responsible for.”
“We have a situation at the moment where the Government is charging carbon tax on the portion of diesel and petrol that is biodiesel and bioethanol. There is no excuse for that. It is immoral. Why is it that the Government will not reduce the price of hydrotreated vegetable oil, HVO, in this situation? Hauliers are crying out for a reduction in HVO prices. They want to make a change to a fuel that is carbon neutral but they cannot because the Government will not reduce the tax on it. It seems to me that this Government is oblivious to the pain and suffering families are going through at this moment of real fuel arrears and pain. Unless it actually pauses and gets rid of any increases in carbon taxes and reduces carbon taxes while there is a surge in prices, it will do more damage to families.”
“The Government is saying the worst is yet to come. It is planning to put up carbon taxes in a number of weeks. Last week, all of the Ministers travelled all around the world. They burned through 200 million tonnes of carbon. This week, they are saying we need to put up carbon taxes to stop people using carbon. The hypocrisy is incredible. Fuel is not a luxury good; it is a staple good. People need it. This is not a progressive tax. It hurts people in the lowest income brackets and rural Ireland the most. The hypocrisy of Ministers just back from flights where they burned through 200 million tonnes of carbon saying that in five weeks they are going to put carbon taxes on families is incredible. I wish to quickly raise the issue of biodiesel and bioethanol.”
“He went to buy home heating oil but he could not afford it. He has a few sticks left in his backyard. That is all he has to heat his home currently with one open fire. He can heat one room in his house at the moment and he has no hot water at all. It is absolutely scandalous. In 2024 and 2025, the Tánaiste's Government took more than €4.1 billion in fuel taxes. The Government is making more on fuel taxes now than it ever did before. In the cost-of-living crisis, the Government is quids-in in terms of fuel taxes in this country. As diesel increased by 35 cent, the Government took 8 cent extra in VAT. The Government is profiteering off the misery of families in terms of the fuel crisis. The State is €14 million better off because of the taxes caused by this energy crisis across the country. That is scandalous.”
“The past two weeks have seen a significant increase in fuel prices for families. It is now costing well over €100 to fill a tank of petrol or diesel for a normal family at the moment. That is absolutely scandalous. Incredibly, 65% of that cost is Government tax. Of the cost of petrol at the pumps currently, 65% is Government tax. This Government is an engine of fuel inflation in this country. This Government is pushing up the price of fuel now. Home heating oil is well on its way to costing €2,000. Again, it is the same with the majority of this tax, which is absolutely scandalous. This is coming at a time when 300,000 families are in energy arrears. That is roughly about 900,000 people. Nearly 1 million people are in energy arrears. I spoke to an older gentleman in the past couple of days.”
“Okay. At the meeting the Minister had with the families along with Simon Harris, it was understood that the 16 weeks were going to come to an end roughly now and that is what the families understand, which is a problem. In 2014, Temple Street said it had 500 children with spina bifida in its care. Now CHI has 254 children in its care. I want the Minister to outline why that is the case. I do not want to take time from my colleague on that. It would be really important to have external oversight of CHI currently. Given that the situation is happening, we need to have external oversight of what is happening in CHI, in both the clinical and management areas.”
“When there are dozens of reasons given over time as to why information cannot be provided to families or advocacy groups, we should not be surprised that people are sceptical and cynical about the reasons for it. The Nayagam report is another example of that. Phase 1 has been completed but families have been refused sight, supposedly for legal reasons. The family of Harvey Morrison Sherratt are not getting the information they need. Documents are being redacted. Documents are being withheld even from the legal representatives of the advocacy groups. Now we hear today of the facilitator. I believe that is a downgrading from an independent mediator down to a facilitator. The 16 weeks for terms of reference to be decided should be coming to an end now-----”
“At the heart of this is a human tragedy. The response to a recent parliamentary question I submitted showed that in the last five years 126 individuals have been damaged up to and including permanent incapacity or death at CHI. A total of 752 other individuals have been damaged needing medical treatment. There have been 6,900 dangerous system failures within that organisation. Some 23,000 other incidents were reported in that period. The answer to another parliamentary question I put in recently showed that 525 scoliosis surgeries on children have been cancelled in the last four years and that increased from 85 in 2022 to 164 last year, so it is increasing all the time. I do not believe the Minister has explained why that is the case. Organisations defend themselves; that is what organisations do.”
“Tá go leor daoine ó Bhaile Átha Cliath, ó Dhroichead Átha, ón Muileann gCearr, agus An Uaimh ag iarraidh a bheith ina gcónaí i Ráth Chairn chun a gclanna a thógáil le Gaeilge, ach ní féidir leo é sin a dhéanamh. Tá go leor Gaeltachtaí cosúil leis sin thar timpeall na tíre. Tá mé ag smaoineamh ar An Spidéal, ar Bhaile Bhuirne agus ar An Rinn atá in aice le bailte móra. Is slí éasca í seo rud éigin a dhéanamh. Níl aon uaillmhian ag an Rialtas seo. Fiú nuair a bhí Éamon de Valera ann mar cheannaire ar Fhianna Fáil, bhí sé uaillmhianach go leor Gaeltacht a bhunú i gContae na Mí chun cabhrú leis an nGaeilge feidhmiú sa chuid sin den tír. An bhfuil an Teachta Gogarty ag teacht isteach?”
“Ní gá go mbeadh plean, ráiteas nó bróisiúr nua ag teacht ón Rialtas. Is gníomh é seo gur féidir leis a dhéanamh. Bhí an tAire ag rá go bhfuil sé ag obair go dian ach is obair gan torthaí atá i gceist i ndáiríre ar an ábhar seo. Aontaím go huile is go hiomlán gur cheart go mbeadh Údarás na Gaeltachta ina údarás tithíochta. Níl suim, taithí ná eolas ag an gcuid is mó de na húdaráis áitiúla ar cad atá ar siúl sa Ghaeltacht agus níl siad dírithe ar thithe nua a thógáil sa Ghaeltacht. Tá an t-eolas agus an saineolas sin ag Údarás na Gaeltachta agus cén fáth nach gcuirfí é sa ról sin? Tá sé chomh simplí agus chomh loighciúil sin. Ba cheart go mbeadh foireann ag an údarás chun an jab sin a dhéanamh agus a bhainistiú. Ba cheart go mbeadh an t-airgead aige freisin chun é sin a dhéanamh. Tá mise i mo chónaí in aice le Ráth Chairn.”
“An dara rud ná go bhfuil éileamh mór ag teacht ó mhuintir na Gaeltachta, ó dhaoine óga agus ó pháirtnéirí óga a bheith ina cónaí sna háiteanna sin. Tá sé dochreidte. De ghnáth, bíonn an Rialtas agus na meáin cumarsáide sa tír seo ag caint faoi Ghaeilge éigeantach. Ach i ndáiríre, i go leor earnáil, tá Béarla éigeantach ann. Seo daoine óga atá ag iarraidh bheith ina gcónaí sa Ghaeltacht. Tá siad ag iarraidh clann a thógáil sa Ghaeltacht agus tá an Rialtas ag cur bac orthu é sin a dhéanamh. Bhí comhrá agam cúpla uair le Aire na Gaeltachta, an Teachta Calleary, agus dúirt mé leis gur cheart go mbeadh sé in ann tithe a thógáil sa Ghaeltacht agus iad a dhíol le muintir na háite nó iad siúd atá ag iarraidh clann a thógáil le Gaeilge. Tá sé dochreidte gur shéan an Rialtas go dtí seo an rud beag sin a dhéanamh. Níl sé casta.”
“Gabhaim buíochas le Sinn Féin as an mBille tábhachtach seo a thabhairt os comhair na Dála. Is í an Ghaeltacht tobar na Gaeilge agus gan í ní bheidh todhchaí ag an nGaeilge ar chor ar bith i ndáiríre. Má táimid dáiríre faoin nGaeilge, ceann de na chéad rudaí atá tábhachtach ná go mbeadh clann in ann a cuid pháistí a thógáil sa Ghaeltacht. Muna bhfuilimid in ann clann a thógáil sa Ghaeltacht ní bheidh páistí óga ag fás suas le Gaeilge níos mó. Ceann de na rudaí is measa mar gheall ar an nGaeilge ag an mbomaite ná go bhfuil líon na ndaoine atá in ann Gaeilge a labhairt ag titim fós sa Ghaeltacht. Tá sé sin dochreidte agus má leanann sé ar aghaidh, ciallaíonn sé nach mbeidh an Ghaeilge mar theanga phobal sa Ghaeltacht sa todhchaí. Gan teanga phobal, ní bheidh aon saibhreas nó láidreacht sa teanga ar chor ar bith sa todhchaí. Sin an céad rud.”
“Má chuireann daoine glaoch ar sheirbhísí Stáit, de ghnáth ní bhíonn duine le Gaeilge ar an taobh eile den líne chun aon rud a fhreagairt. Caithfidh an Rialtas cur leis an stádas. Chun é sin a dhéanamh, caithfear infheistíocht a bheith ann. Mar gheall ar na pleananna, tá plean nua ann agus cuirim fáilte roimhe sin ach, i ndáiríre, theip ar an bplean deireanach. Níor chuir an Rialtas an plean deireanach i bhfeidhm ar chor ar bith. Ní fiú plean nua a bheith ann muna bhfuil an Rialtas chun é a chur i bhfeidhm i gceart. Ciallaíonn sé sin go gcaithfidh an toil agus an t-airgead a bheith ann. Ní fheicim é sin. Más maith leis an Aire legacy ceart a fhágáil ina dhiaidh, ba chóir go ndéanfadh sé rud éigin mar gheall ar thithíocht sa Ghaeltacht agus rud mar gheall ar scoileanna lán Ghaeilge agus go gcuirfeadh sé leis an stádas.”
“Cén fáth go bhfuil cúlú ann mar gheall ar réiteach atá chomh héasca sin? Is é sin an dara rud. Muna bhfuil an Rialtas sásta cur leis an méid Gaelscoileanna atá ann, ní bheadh muid ag cur leis an líon daoine le Gaeilge líofa sa tír seo. Is é an chéad rud eile ná stádas. Muna bhfuil stádas cuí ag an nGaeilge sa tír seo, ní bheidh daoine ag tabhairt aird uirthi. Is é an t-aon dea-scéal atá ann mar gheall ar an nGaeilge anois ná na meáin shóisialta. Nuair a bhreathnaíonn tú ar Twitter, TikTok ná na meáin shóisialta eile, feiceann tú domhan saibhir nua láidir ann mar gheall ar an nGaeilge. Ba cheart go mbeadh an Rialtas ag cur leis an stádas. Chun é sin a dhéanamh, caithfear seirbhísí a bheith ar fáil i nGaeilge sa Ghaeltacht agus sa Ghalltacht.”
“Bhí daoine óga ón nGaeltacht agus ón bhfeachtas BÁNÚ ag iarraidh cur in iúl don Rialtas nach bhfuil sé féaráilte dóibh nach bhfuil siad in ann teach a fháil ina gceantair féin. Ní fheicim aon réiteach ar an scéal seo ag teacht ón Rialtas. Is é an dara rud chun cur leis an nGaeilge na Gaelscoileanna. Nuair a tháinig an tAire isteach sa Teach seo, bhí níos mó páistí ag freastal ar Ghaelscoileanna ná mar atá inniu. Tá an tAire 20 bliain anseo, an bhfuil? Tá sé beagnach 20 bliain anseo. Bhí níos mó páistí ag freastal ar Ghaelscoileanna 20 bliain ó shin ná mar atá inniu. Nach bhfuil sé seo dochreidte? Is é sin an tslí is éasca chun an Ghaeilge a thabhairt don chéad ghlúin eile mar ní bhíonn siad ag foghlaim na Gaeilge. Bíonn siad cosúil le sponge. Bíonn an teanga ag dul iontu gan aon strus ná aon fhadhb ar chor ar bith.”
“Mar gheall ar thithíocht, is ceann de na príomhfhadhbanna atá ann ná nach bhfuil go leor tithe sa Ghaeltacht le haghaidh daoine óga atá ag iarraidh clann a thógáil ann. Dúirt mé é seo leis an Aire cúpla bliain ó shin. Ba cheart go mbeadh an Rialtas ag tógáil eastáit tithíochta sa Ghaeltacht. Tá go leor de na Gaeltachtaí - labhair mé faoi Ráth Chairn, An Spidéal, An Rinn agus Baile Bhuirne - in aice le bailte móra nó cathracha. Tá go leor daoine sna bailte móra agus cathracha sin ag iarraidh a gclanna a thógáil le Gaeilge. Ba mhaith leo dul amach go dtí an Ghaeltacht agus é sin a dhéanamh ach níl tithe le fáil dóibh. Tá seans ag an Aire eastáit tithíochta a thógáil iontu chun go mbeadh na tithe sin ar fáil. Chonaiceamar protests taobh amuigh de gheataí Theach Laighean inniu.”
“I ndáiríre, níl scéal iontach ag titim amach sa tír seo mar gheall ar an nGaeilge. Tá sé ag éirí níos measa bliain i ndiaidh bliana mar gheall ar na príomhrudaí atá i gceist. Táim ag caint faoin líon daoine atá ag caint na Gaeilge go laethúil sa Ghaeltacht. I mo thuairim, is é sin an príomhchuspóir gur cheart a bheith ag aon rialtas. Tá líon na ndaoine atá ag caint na Gaeilge go laethúil ag titim bliain i ndiaidh bliana. Is í an Ghaeltacht an tobar atá ann. Nuair a bhíonn pobal Gaeltachta ann, bíonn an Ghaeilge níos doimhne agus níos saibhre. Ní hionann Gaeltacht agus líonra Gaeilge. Caithfimid díriú ar conas gur féidir linn cur leis an líon daoine atá ag caint Gaeilge go laethúil sa Ghaeltacht ar an gcéad dul síos.”
“That so much has been spent on achieving so little for women who were owed so much by the State is a disgrace. Will the Taoiseach apologise for disrespecting these women yet again?”
“In May 2018, Leo Varadkar stood in this Chamber and promised no woman affected by CervicalCheck would be forced to go to court to get justice. In 2019, he apologised for the disrespect, humiliation and deceit shown by the State to the women affected by the CervicalCheck scandal. In September 2021, I said in this Chamber, and a number of times since, that the tribunal would not work. Indeed, it has not worked. We have learned the tribunal has been shut down without a single red cent awarded to any of these women. Not only were they failed disastrously by CervicalCheck, but they have been failed disastrously again. Incredibly, €3.4 million was spent on offices, leases and fit-outs for an organisation that did not give one red cent to the women who need it.”
“In May, the Government will put up the carbon tax on gas to €71 a tonne. In the middle of this energy crisis his strategy is to make it harder for those families to actually pay for gas and that will come back on the electricity that people pay for as well.”
“The Taoiseach often answers questions nobody has asked in this situation on weekly basis. It is like a pretend debate where he answers questions that nobody has actually posed to him at all and he ignores the questions that are specifically posed to him. We are not looking to decrease the tax base. We are asking him to stop increasing the carbon tax base. That is what the actual question was. Right now 300,000 people in arrears on electricity bills in this country. How does it make the Taoiseach feel that he has families in a constant state of turmoil on the consumption of a basic staple? How does it make him feel that this is not an aberration? This is a permanent outcome of his energy policy in this country. Three hundred thousand people is an enormous number of people to be suffering significantly every single year in terms of energy.”
“However, if the market is already reaching that price, surely the carbon tax is just punitive in relation to that. We were told that the carbon tax was about moving people into alternatives, such as sustainable transport or other ways of heating their homes. If they cannot do that, is a carbon tax not just punitive in that scenario? Will the Taoiseach scrap the carbon tax on petrol and diesel if the cost increases beyond current levels?”
“This should not be happening because the supply chain purchased this oil before the crisis in Iran. Again, according to academics, a fill of home heating oil could actually top out at €2,000 in this particular situation. Incredibly, the Government will be quids in from this increase in the price of fuel. Not only are families being price gouged, but the truth of the matter is that this Government is tax gouging in these circumstances. When the price of fuel increases in this country, the Government makes more in taxation on that increased price. That is an incredible situation. What I am proposing is that the Government looks at the carbon taxes. We were told that carbon taxes were to change behaviour and that this was to move people away fossil fuels, and when we reached a certain price, people would then make that change.”
“In 2024, the Government took €4.1 billion in fuel taxes. That was the highest such figure ever, and it happened at the peak of the cost-of-living crisis. In 2024, carbon tax reached €1 billion for the first time. It is now the largest fuel tax in the country, and it is going to increase for every year up to 2030 no matter what the economic circumstance of the citizens of this country. The war in Iran will likely send the cost of fuel surging. Academics are saying that the price of petrol could increase by 70 cent to €2.44. Diesel could increase by 81 cent to €2.53. That would bring a full tank for petrol and diesel in this country above €150. These are eye-watering figures. This is already happening. On Friday, a fill of home heating oil cost about €1,000 in the State, and it has increased by about €150 in just four days.”
“The cost of filling a car with petrol at the moment is €100. It is €19 above what was just five years ago. Some 60% of the cost of a litre of diesel is now tax, and 65% of the cost of a litre of petrol is now tax. This breaks down as follows: 54 cent in excise; 2 cent on the National Oil Reserve Agency, NORA; 16 cent on carbon tax; 8 cent on better energy tax; and 32 cent on VAT. Out of the €1.73 price for a litre of petrol, €1.13 is now Government tax. The Government is taking the majority of the cost of a litre of petrol and diesel in tax. A €100 fill of a tank would actually cost €35 if it was not for the ever-increasing fuel taxes by this Government. These taxes are not progressive. They hurt low- and middle-income families the most, and they hurt those in regional and rural Ireland the most.”
“Until the Minister gets to address these issues, he will join a long line of about five or six Ministers who have crashed and burned in relation to the objectives of the housing Department. That is not the holy all of it. The main problem is the families who are made homeless as a result of that situation. There is a permanent government in place in relation to all these objectives. They are driving the bus and the Ministers present are simply passengers on that bus. Unless that changes, we will be back here year after year looking at the situation.”
“People should not get me wrong; I understand that there are civic society groups that stand for proper planning and development and should have the ability to influence or put in objections. However, we need to start targeting vexatious objectors and the vexatious judicial reviewers in this process. One of my biggest frustrations with this Government has been the type of debate that we have had on this issue over the years. It has been a very one-dimensional debate. It is happening between the Government and a certain section of the Opposition. We need to have a deeper debate on how we make house building viable in this country without putting the weight on the families who are looking to buy those homes or the renters who are looking to rent those homes. People need to be allowed to build in their own local areas.”
“However, it is also because the Government is not staffing the planning authorities or An Coimisiún Pleanála to the level they need. It is also because it puts layer upon layer of bureaucracy on the system year after year. If the Government does not tackle that, we are going to have a massive problem. At the moment Ireland has 26 judicial reviews for every 1 million people. Britain has five judicial reviews for every 1 million people. It is becoming a national sport here. We have proposed a Bill to prevent vexatious objections to construction. Right now, if I live in the Minister of State's constituency in Cork, I can put in an objection to a person in Donegal building a slatted shed on their farm, which is an incredible situation. A person with no material interest in a particular project can put in an objection.”
“Imagine if it was done for house-building, for the people who are building their own houses or the families who want to get into a first-time house in their locality. This Government is absolutely laden down with red tape and bureaucracy. I have mentioned this to the Minister a number of times before. Unless he actually gets to the heart of this, he will never fix this problem. We have the slowest planning, permitting, licensing, tendering and judicial review system in the whole of Europe. It takes a phenomenally long time to build anything. This is not just affecting the housing crisis. We cannot build flood defences, rail lines and the other infrastructure necessary to allow people to live, and that is a significant problem. The habitats directive has a big influence on that.”
“However, at a time when the Government is putting €10 billion into a savings account on an annual basis, surely there is another method to make house-building viable. In my constituency there are heaps of builders at home who are doing nothing and are not building because it is not viable for them. The majority of the top 50 construction companies in this country are currently sending their workers abroad because it is not viable to build here in Ireland. However, in the North of Ireland there is no VAT on the construction of homes. There is no tax take by the state on the construction of homes in the North of Ireland. The Minister has already accepted that is an activation action by actually doing it for flats and apartments. However, that really only attracts the investment funds into that space.”
“I want to just speak about some of the solutions for this because there is no point in just focusing on the outcomes of the Government's attitude. The Government's residential tenancies Bill will come into play on Monday. That Bill is designed purposely to raise rents. That is the objective of that Bill. The Government does that because it wants to attract investors. It does it because it wants to increase activation and viability. I do not know of any other government in the history of the State that has implemented a Bill whose primary objective is to raise rents. To do it at a time when families are struggling with absolutely astronomical rents is really hard to believe. I accept something needs to be done on the viability question.”
“Up until this situation, we were talking about people on low incomes but we are now actually talking about middle-income families in this situation. Incredibly, families who are on €30,000 or €40,000 and up to €48,000 in some places are being disqualified from housing assistance, leaving them in a situation where they are too wealthy to be able to get housing assistance but too poor to be able to afford rent and in the limbo space of being forced into temporary accommodation. It is an incredible situation. The Government refuses to change the income limits despite the realities of the cost-of-living crisis. This is engineering a section of society which is now falling into homelessness and that is policy-driven.”
“Homelessness takes a psychological toll. We see behaviour regression from children who were once independent. We are seeing documented cases of children aged eight, nine, ten, 11 and 12 years old returning to bed-wetting because of the instability of the situation of they are in and the proximity of strangers in hostels as well. There is a profound sense of stigma for many of these children. Children and teenagers describe as a social death telling people that they are homeless. It is impossible for them to have a friend over, as well the effect that has on the socialisation of those individuals. They do not have a wall to put a poster on, a door to close behind them or a proper bed to sleep in at night.”
“One parent talked about their child having to eat a dry breakfast out of a plastic bag at a bus stop, just be able to get to school on time. Teachers are reporting the phenomenon of homelessness fatigue because children are having to travel such distances from the temporary homeless hubs to get to the original school they were in. I had not heard of the term "kettle cooking" until recently. A generation of children are now growing up on pot noodles, tea and instant pasta prepared on the floor of their room on their bedside table. That is the nutritional content that we are investing in a whole cohort of children in this country. Other children, because of the distance that they have to travel on buses to get home, are missing meal times in the hubs, and maybe missing the only hot meal of the day as well.”
“One mother described her children's silence, noting that her son had stopped speaking entirely because of the regimented prison-like experience of guards and roll calls in their so-called home. In these hubs, families of five are actually confined to single rooms. The ombudsman reported that children are not making their milestones, such as crawling or walking, just because they simply do not have enough floor space to be able to get moving. In some of these areas there are floors that are damp and rooms full of people that are full of mildew. There is the noise of strangers, heard through paper-thin walls. The school run has become a marathon for many kids, who have to get up at 5:30 a.m. to get to the school in the area where they lived originally.”