2026-06-10

We move on to Leaders' Questions. Under Standing Order 38 I call Deputy McDonald.

We must address events in Belfast over the past 48 hours. There was a knife attack on Monday night that was barbaric, vicious and depraved; the stuff of nightmares. The victim suffered horrific slash injuries to his eyes, face and neck. Were it not for the selfless bravery of members of the community, including Maitiu Mág Tighearnán putting himself at risk by jumping from his car and using his son’s hurl to stop the brutal assault, the victim would surely have lost his life. I acknowledge and thank the first responders on the scene and the swift action of the PSNI, which apprehended the suspect of this heinous crime. He is now in custody, faces the full weight of the law and must pay a heavy price for this brutal crime. My thoughts are of course with the victim and his family as they live through this nightmare and as he continues to be treated in hospital. It was right that political leaders in the North came together to unequivocally condemn this attack and call for the swift delivery of justice. The assault provoked genuine shock, disgust and anger across communities. Last night, groups of masked men burned families out of their homes, targeted and attacked innocent people and terrified and endangered small children. We witnessed racist intimidation and violence orchestrated by loyalist and far-right thugs. These are people hell-bent on whipping up hatred for their own ends. Many of those leading this violence are the same people who will burn Tricolours on the top of bonfires on 12 July. What occurred last night echoes back to the pogroms on Bombay Street in 1969, when families and children were burnt out of their homes by loyalist mobs. Why? Because they were Catholic and Irish. Many were forced to leave, fleeing for their lives across the Border into Dundalk and beyond. They were refugees in their own country. This was inflicted on Irish nationalists time and again. When we said "never again" and that we would never allow anyone to be treated this way again, we meant it. We meant anyone - not Irish and not any community. Nobody has the right to spread fear, intimidate or terrify innocent families. We have a duty to communities to show political leadership and stand up for what is right. The good, decent people of Belfast have lived through division and hatred before. They wear the scars and pain of those times and will not allow it to happen again. They will not allow their peace and better future to be robbed from them. In the aftermath of this violence, threats have been made to the life of Belfast’s mayor, Róis-Máire Donnelly. She will not bow to these threats of violence against her. She will continue to stand with every community in Belfast and continue to call out racist thugs. I ask the Taoiseach to join with me in offering support to the victim of Monday night's vicious assault and to take this opportunity to condemn unequivocally the appalling, orchestrated violence carried out against innocent families last night.

The events of the last few days in Northern Ireland have filled us with horror. The attack on that young person two nights ago was absolutely savage and horrific. Our thoughts are with the victim and his family. It is beyond our comprehension that a person could wield such violence on another individual in such a manner. The very graphic representation of that on social media has shocked many people. Like the Deputy, I salute the courage of Maitiu Mág Tighearnán for his very brave intervention to essentially save the life of the victim. The violence of last night has to be roundly condemned. I pay tribute to all of the political leaders who yesterday responded in the first instance to the attack of the previous evening, and for the unified message condemning any attacks on individuals, families and homes. What we witnessed last evening is absolutely appalling - that families would be burned out of their homes because of race or ethnic reasons. I join with all Members of this House in condemning unreservedly the attacks of last evening. They were orchestrated. We have had evidence of this in other countries where situations like this are exploited, which results in the violence of the type we saw last evening. All of us have to be very vigilant and clear in standing up for fundamental, human values in terms of the dignity of every single individual in our society. We uphold and defend the dignity of every single individual irrespective of what transpires or occurs and fully support the rule of law. In this instance, we fully support the PSNI in terms of its investigation of both the crime against that young individual and the violence and criminal activity in evidence last evening across the North but particularly in Belfast. An Garda Síochána will continue to work with the PSNI in terms of the broader issues that relate to this. More fundamentally, we must call on all citizens to support the police, in this instance the PSNI, to get swift justice in respect of the appalling attack two nights ago, but also in terms of those who targeted individuals in their homes and burned out people from their homes. This brings back appalling memories of incidents of this kind from the late 1960s and early 1970s but it has a particular manifestation in today’s world. I watched some of the commentary from some social media outlets, and some media platforms of a particular orientation or political disposition which, to say the very least, was decidedly unhelpful in terms of how they portrayed the events of the past 48 hours. There can never be any implied justification for the attacks of last evening.

Hear, hear.

There never can be any attempt at rationalisation of it either. Nobody has the right to take the law into their own hands or to say to someone,“You are not living here any more”.

Of course, everyone has the right to live in safety. That vicious, depraved assault causes all of us disgust. Savagery like that has no place on our streets in any part of Ireland. The perpetrator of an act like that must face the full weight of justice. The organised mobs, and this was organised, who burned families out of their homes and terrified children are the same people who in July will burn Irish Tricolours on the top of their bonfires. These people and their organised racism need to be faced down. To carry out actions like that and then to threaten the life of Belfast's first citizen, Róis-Máire Donnelly, reflects just how serious this matter is. I invite the Taoiseach again to assert that we will jointly face this down and I ask him to address the issue of those threats to Belfast's first citizen.

Such threats are appalling and must be roundly condemned. Unfortunately, it has become a phenomenon in this era that there are increasing numbers of threats to public representatives across the board. To threaten the Lord Mayor in the context of yesterday and the day before is appalling and has to be condemned. All threats to public representatives have to be condemned. Unfortunately, both the Garda and the PSNI are pursuing too many cases where threats are made to the lives of politicians in this House, in the Northern Assembly or, in this case, to the Lord Mayor. We all join in condemning that. We also have to face down racism. We also have to make sure that our Garda here and the PSNI in the North are adequately resourced and supported without any equivocation-----

There is none.

-----in all communities to pursue these people who seem to think they can create an alternative-----

Thank you, Taoiseach. Time is up.

Loyalists.

-----framework to get their way. They must be resisted by all of us.

I condemn the horrific attack in Belfast on Monday. Our thoughts are with the victim and his family. I also condemn the racist attacks last night and join others in calling for an end to the violence. I will talk to the Taoiseach today about the extreme pressure family carers are under. Some 71% are now struggling to make ends meet, according to the recent Family Carers Ireland report. Nearly half are experiencing extreme loneliness, are desperate for support that never comes and are feeling like their world is shrinking. This is an indictment of the Taoiseach's Government. The State, which should be there to help them, is actually making their lives harder and pushing an increasing number of carers into poverty. That is the grim reality. Imagine how frustrating it is for those carers to hear this Government's repeated claims that it values their work as they are forced to pay out-of-pocket for essential equipment and therapies that should be provided by the State. They are forced to jump through endless hoops just to qualify for carer's allowance and are living in constant fear that a new review or a new assessment will push them just over the threshold leaving them with nothing - no financial support and no services. Catherine Rossiter, who cares for her 12-year-old twins, Aoife and Eoghan, launched this report with Family Carers Ireland. She said: I often think my life is a test of human endurance. How much can I take as a carer before I break? What will happen to my young daughter and son then? The worry feels endless. This is the reality for so many carers across the country. They are exhausted, drained and filled with dread when they think about the future. The vast majority of carers in this position are women. They are saving the State billions of euro every year and what are they getting in return? Loneliness, burn-out and poverty. The Government has a growing reputation for making commitments and abandoning them. It committed to abolishing the means test for carers. Carers have had enough of empty promises, so will the Government keep this one? There is no excuse not to do so. We can afford it. It would cost €266 million, according to the report by the Parliamentary Budget Office. It could be paid for by tripling the bank levy on banks earning record profits, with money left over to invest in services. Will the Government abolish the means test for carers in the forthcoming budget? Will it give carers that reassurance of making that commitment to them now?

The Government does acknowledge and takes very seriously the role of carers in our society. I acknowledge that we have made commitments in the programme for Government, particularly the commitment in terms of the weekly income disregard and that we would eliminate the means test, essentially. Already, as part of the most recent budget, and from this July, the weekly income disregard will increase from €625 to €1,000 for a single person and from €1,250 to €2,000 for carers who are part of a couple. The latest reforms will result in more carers qualifying for carer's allowance. In effect, it means that a carer in a two-adult household with an income of approximately €110,000 will still retain their full carer's payment, and even with an income of €138,000 will retain a partial payment. That is a significant step taken already in respect of the programme for Government commitment to abolish the means test for carer's allowance over the lifetime of the Government, which is the commitment we made. In addition to that, the carer's support grant of €2,000 is paid this month. We will in the forthcoming budget further develop on that commitment and further realise it in terms of the income disregard and the means test. We increased the core weekly social welfare rates by €10. The highest ever increases in child support payments occurred in the last budget. I took a keen interest in that with the Minister, Dara Calleary, because of the unit in my Department dealing with child poverty. We increased the child support payment for children aged 12 or over by €16 to €78 and for children under 12 by €8 to €58. Since 2020, that is, in the past five years, the weekly child support payment has increased by 95% for children aged 12 or over and by 61% for children under 12. I heard the Children's Rights Alliance this morning describe that as a significant move, although recent inflation in fuel prices has negated it to some extent. Nonetheless, it is recognised generally as a more targeted way of dealing with child poverty. We have increased the fuel allowance. We increased the domiciliary care allowance by €20, bringing it to €380 per month now. That has gone up by €70 since 2022. We are progressively increasing key payments that will help carers and children who are being cared for. The Minister is also working on proposals, and there has been a public consultation, in respect of the cost-of-disability payment. A lot of work has been done on that. There was a focus network summit on 13 May last in respect of that specific issue, which was hosted by the Minister for Social Protection.

The Taoiseach says he acknowledges the role of carers and acknowledges the need to abolish the means test ultimately over the lifetime of this Government. I assume he acknowledges, then, that the changes in the threshold do not abolish it but, rather, slowly work towards that. I appreciate that the Government is doing that but if I am right, I can take it from the Taoiseach's reply that the Government does not plan to abolish it entirely in this budget, and that it is something it plans to do over the lifetime of the Government. I ask the Taoiseach to reconsider that because when you consider the very fortunate position the Government is in in terms of record surpluses as well as the reality of this report, which shows that 75% of carers have never received respite, 76% have cut back on non-essentials, 32% report bad mental health and 48% experience severe loneliness, this is something the Government can do now. It would cost €266 million when carers are saving the State billions of euro. I ask the Taoiseach to seriously reconsider and to consider doing this in the next budget. It is something the Government has committed to doing. It needs to happen now. Will the Government do it?

As I said, we are going to do it. We did give the commitment that it would happen over the lifetime of the Government. I would not underestimate the step we have already taken because I think that when this lands in July, the increase in the income disregard will actually be quite significant, maybe more significant than people thought. We will make a further significant move in the forthcoming budget and I think we will be well on the way then to eliminating the means test. Of course, there is a wide variety of measures we have to take to improve the situation for carers and people with disabilities more generally. We are looking at a new transport scheme to be introduced by the Department of Transport and the Minister for Transport, which we have been working on in the Cabinet subcommittee on disability. I mentioned already family support payments and the cost-of-disability initiative. There is a wide range of areas, if you bring them all together, that will make a meaningful difference. Of course, there is the investment in core services as well. What can alleviate a lot of pressures on people is providing other supports such as-----

Your time is up, Taoiseach.

-----therapies, as we are doing in the school-based therapy service, which will take some pressure off carers.

I call Deputy Ivana Bacik.

Before I begin, my thoughts are with the man who remains seriously injured in hospital, and with his family, following Monday's brutal knife attack in north Belfast. I also condemn the appalling violence perpetrated against Northern Ireland's migrant communities overnight and commend the work of the emergency services in response. We must all condemn those who seek to exploit any awful incident in order to target ethnic minority and immigrant communities. We saw it here during the Dublin riots in November 2023. All of us have a responsibility to unite against racism and violence. I will raise with the Taoiseach the final report of the south east independent commission of investigation - the report into the depraved systemic sexual abuse of children by the paedophile, Bill Kenneally, which was published yesterday. The details set out in the report are nothing short of horrendous. So many young lives were destroyed by his vile and heinous crimes. I pay tribute to all the survivors. What they endured is the stuff of nightmares. Bill Kenneally tortured young boys over many years in unfathomable ways. He exploited his position of authority to abuse them. He ensured their silence through blackmail and intimidation. When some of his young victims found the courage to report him, their bravery was met with inertia and cover-up by the Garda and by those who should have been protecting them, whose duty it was to protect them. For far too long they were not protected. The report is unequivocal. There was a clear dereliction of duty by senior gardaí in dealing with Kenneally's disgusting crimes. Had proper procedures been followed, and had the children been taken seriously, more children could have been protected from suffering at the hands of Bill Kenneally. No institution comes out of the report well - not the Garda, not the health authorities, not sporting bodies, not Fianna Fáil and not the Catholic Church. It now falls to the Taoiseach and the Government to respond. I am still reading the report, as we all are. It is very detailed, but we know it makes a number of important recommendations. It recommends in particular an urgent review of the need to introduce a criminal offence of misconduct in public office. That in particular follows the failure of former Fianna Fáil Deputy, Brendan Kenneally, to contact authorities after he became aware of his cousin's campaign of abuse in 2001. We understand that the Taoiseach will offer a State apology to Bill Kenneally's victims. That is very welcome, but survivors deserve clarity about when that will happen. After the ordeal they suffered, the minimum these men deserve is the Taoiseach's respect. I regret to say that the decision by the Minister, Deputy Jim O'Callaghan, to share this 400-page report with the survivors so close to publication did not show sufficient respect, as they have said. We have seen this before. Survivors of mother and baby homes were forced to learn key findings of that report through the media. We understand that survivors of Kenneally's vile crimes were given only 24 hours to digest the report before its findings were all over the news. Will the Taoiseach do right by Bill Kenneally's survivors? Will he engage respectfully and directly with them? Will he commence the process of introducing that crucial new offence and will he implement the other recommendations of the report into his crimes?

First of all, I want to say without equivocation that the crimes committed by Bill Kenneally were absolutely horrific over a prolonged period of time and caused immense trauma and suffering to many people and families. I am reading through the report, like Deputy Bacik. The judge, Michael White, has been very clear in terms of the central finding of a failure and a dereliction of duty in relation to the way An Garda Síochána dealt with this, particularly in 1987 when the perpetrator himself, Bill Kenneally, was in the Garda station and almost acknowledged culpability in respect of this, and the failure to do things properly in terms of taking statements and sending them to the DPP at the time. There are wider issues as to why the Garda was not in a position to do that and so forth, but I am not going to go through that here. That, in my view, and also some failings in terms of the health board at the time, demand a State apology. That is my clear reading of the report so far. There is no equivocation by the commission in terms of that central conclusion in respect of the failure to deal with this properly and comprehensively at the time, even by the standards of the day. The report goes into the contrast, which it describes as profound, in terms of the understanding and the framework and edifice we have in place today for child protection, but even by the standards of the late 1980s the commission says it is absolutely not acceptable. There is then also the behaviour of others, including the former public representative, former TD, Brendan Kenneally, at the time. The commission is very clear that it fell below the standards that one would expect. It seems to me that the recommendation that has been made pertains to the failure of An Garda Síochána in terms of that central failure to prosecute, and to do what one would consider to be the basic investigative response required to deal with the facts and the position that were known at the time. There were then failures to alert others. There was a failure to alert the Vikings basketball club by people who knew. To be very straight, there was a failure to notify the Fianna Fáil Party locally. That is very clear in the report. It was not notified at that time-----

I thank the Taoiseach. I call Deputy Bacik.

-----by those who knew also.

I call Deputy Bacik to respond.

It is a damning report in that respect. We will follow through on it.

The Taoiseach will be back in.

We hope to arrange time in the House to have a proper consideration of this report.

I thank the Taoiseach for his considered response. Like him, I commend the judge, Michael White, on all his work and for taking on this report and giving us such a comprehensive picture. I agree that we need a debate in this House once we have had time to digest the full findings of the report. Unfortunately, however, there have been so many of these situations where we have seen paedophilia covered up and even facilitated by State agencies, and where we have seen failures to support and protect victims and survivors. I am thinking of the survivors of Eamonn Cooke, the survivors of industrial schools, the brave individuals who came forward about the "Blackrock Boys" and the survivors of Michael Shine. Deputy Nash has been speaking out on behalf of survivors in that appalling situation. I know the scoping inquiry is due to report soon. We have been looking for a public inquiry into the litany of failure there in respect to victims. The State must clearly do better. I know, as the Taoiseach said, there are better procedures in place now, but we can still do more. On 25 June, in this House we will be putting forward the Labour Party's Bill to ensure that where religious orders have colluded in cover-ups, that they can be pursued in order to facilitate the payment of redress to victims.

The Deputy's time is up. I call on the Taoiseach to respond.

This is another step in ensuring survivors and victims are supported and protected and the justice system responds.

We need to let the report speak for itself. It does not have a finding of a cover-up, a conspiracy or collusion. We have to be true to the report of the commission. However, it does have a finding of gross dereliction of duty and the need to reform the law in that respect, which the Minister will now be pursuing with the Law Reform Commission, as recommended by the commission. Yes, we can do better. The State has initiated quite a range of inquiries, as the Deputy iterated, going back to the industrial schools. We have a scoping inquiry under way on the victims of Michael Shine. The Minister for Health is working on that and also on other inquiries at the moment. We must also make sure that State authorities and every official are aware of all the responsibilities people have in respect of any reporting and the necessity to report.

I thank the Taoiseach.

In my view, in the first instance it bears rearticulation that any abuse allegation should be reported to the Garda.

I call Deputy Coppinger.

I want to send my sympathy and solidarity to the man who was brutally attacked in Belfast, and to all affected by the subsequent racist violence. I am going to refer to it in my Questions on Policy or Legislation. I will raise with the Taoiseach again the issue of gender-based violence, which he and the Government acknowledge is an epidemic. It is largely unreported. One of the key reasons is the hostile, traumatising and misogynistic legal system that so many complainants face. Survivors' counselling notes being used in trials has been an issue raised on the floor of this Dáil and campaigned on for over a year now by survivors and by the Rape Crisis Centre. The handling of this issue by the Government is shocking and disgraceful. It is shoehorning that issue into 12 or 13 others. It is squeezing it with so many issues into a new Bill, which will finish tonight at 9.15 p.m. or so. We will gather here and survivors will be in that Gallery because they want to come and see this through to the end. They will see it squeezed and, potentially, amendments will not be reached for debate. These are amendments that were sought by survivors and by the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, whose representatives the Minister refused to even meet to discuss their proposals for dealing with this. I think the Minister let the cat out of the bag on Committee Stage when he asked a Sinn Féin Deputy and me what if an individual he was counselling provided information to him in that counselling session and, subsequently, a criminal trial took place and he had a record of what was said to him that completely undermined what was said in the prosecution - in other words, women lie and counselling notes can potentially be used as evidence to try to catch them out. He said that he cannot ban the counselling notes. What the Minister has always said, and the Taoiseach has said, is that it is unconstitutional but the Taoiseach had a chance even within the Constitution to make really strong privilege. Very quickly, in the 45 seconds, he has done nothing to limit or regulate the Garda or Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP, seeking the notes. The rape crisis centre had asked for a court order at that stage. It does not improve the standard for disclosure. The Government broke a promise to introduce presumption of non-disclosure explicitly. It does not require the accused to engage with the facts of the case at application stage. It removes survivors' agency to consent or not. It continues the violating practise of raw counselling notes being handed to lawyers and the accused. It does not expressly state that counselling notes are not evidence. There is no legal advice to survivors about the whole process. The complainant is only notified of an application order after the court order pre-trial hearing is given. There is a total ban in Tasmania but I think the Taoiseach could have gone much longer. Survivors are extremely disappointed.

At the outset, the Deputy made an assertion in respect of the Minister. She kind of made a few leaps and sort of said that the Minister is saying that women lie in court cases. That is outrageous and should be withdrawn. There is no room for that in debates of this kind. We are all coming to this issue in a bona fide way. That is the first point I would make. There is no agenda here. We agree that violence against women and domestic violence, in particular, is at an appalling level. There are multiple factors responsible for that and legislation can help. The reforms the previous Government and this one have introduced, particularly the establishment of Cuan, the expansion of refuge places, which needs to happen faster and at a more accelerated pace if we can get the infrastructure delivered, and a range of other measures are testament to that. There are also cultural issues and issues to deal with the increased prevalence of violent pornography online and so forth, which we really have to deal with and which is a factor in the level of violence against women and the misogyny we are experiencing in our societies. The Minister has sought within the constitutional framework and within constitutional parameters to deal with the issue of disclosure. The Civil Law and Criminal Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill endeavours to do that to ensure, in the first instance, that judicial oversight governs the disclosure of any counselling records so that the rights of victims to privacy are always taken into account. On 19 May, the Minister brought forward further amendments to the legislation to further restrict the disclosure of counselling records. In this context, the presumption of non-disclosure was introduced in relation to these records. A presumption of non-disclosure ensures the legal status of these records is that they are not to be released except in certain circumstances. The current protection regime will also be extended to the following personal records: medical records, child protection records and social work records. Those records often contain highly personal information and are currently routinely disclosed. These reforms will ensure that any disclosure of sensitive material only occurs where necessary and always subject to strict judicial scrutiny. It is a significant strengthening of the law over what we have. It restores the original intent of the original legislation and it is a better balance between competing rights. Of course, the constitutional rights are significant in terms of the accused's rights to a fair trial. The Minister is not just saying this for the sake of saying it. There are significant constitutional issues that have to be navigated in the drafting of this legislation. This is a significant improvement on where we are and it should be acknowledged as such.

I think the Minister's remarks could certainly be interpreted that way. They show a complete lack of understanding about the impact of this issue and also about how therapy works wherein people can often blame themselves; they can take on guilt or they could say that maybe it was their fault and all sorts of things. I am not going to go into all the details again. I am just going to state what is in the law. Within the Constitution, there are other rights. There is the right to privacy, a right to dignity and a right to healthcare. I believe there are contending rights there. I am not saying it is easy but I think it could have been addressed. There are human rights as well. Even within the limit if the law, however, Dublin Rape Crisis Centre did contribute a detailed submission. Senior counsel, who the Minister knows, drafted it. There is not a presumption of non-disclosure stated in the Bill. That is the reality. It could have been stated. The rape crisis centre put forward the idea of a narrative rather than raw counsel notes being handed over. The Canadian system seems to be what the Minister is repeating, which has not reduced requests for access to the notes.

I appreciate the Deputy has acknowledged that it is not easy and that there are difficulties in terms of framing legislation within constitutional parameters here. That is at the core of this. I would have much empathy with the broad argument in terms of the disclosure of counselling notes. However, this legislation represents a very significant improvement and strengthening of the legislation on behalf of women, in particular, as opposed to what we had. There had been a request for additional time. My understanding is that was facilitated by the Chief Whip, and there will be two hours and 30 minutes in total this evening for the conclusion of the legislation.