2026-05-19

I hope colleagues will assist when I break with the normal rules of not welcoming anyone during Leaders' Questions. Today we have a very special welcome in giving a big, warm céad míle fáilte to an incredible young man, Mr. Austin Appelbee, age 13. Deputies may have heard Austin's story from February this year, when he undertook an incredible act of bravery in Western Australia. In order to save the lives of his mother Joanne, his brother Beau and his sister Grace, Austin undertook a four-hour, 4 km swim followed by a 2 km run to contact emergency services, which ultimately led to everyone being rescued by emergency services. What an incredible feat. We are delighted to have Austin and his family here today in the Public Gallery. You are most welcome.

Fáilte, Austin. Deputy Carthy is telling me that Austin is a Monaghan man. The Ceann Comhairle missed the most important element of the story. Comhghairdeas agus fáilte. Three years on from the financial scandals that rocked RTÉ, the State broadcaster is once again embroiled in controversy. The latest debacle centres on RTÉ revising the list of its top ten highest earning presenters to include Mr. Derek Mooney. It transpires that Mr. Mooney should have been on the list for the last five years, but his salary of almost €200,000 was kept a secret by the top brass at RTÉ. Strangely, in 2020, Mr. Mooney's role was reclassified as a producer rather than a presenter, although the dogs in the street know that Derek Mooney is a presenter. RTÉ's top earners' list was incorrect eight years in a row - transparency out the window again. People will remember the secret payments and the slush fund controversies, scandals which revealed a shocking absence of oversight and governance, exposing a culture of arrogance and entitlement, RTÉ top brass flaithiúlach with the use of public money. Despite a massive bailout and big promises from the Government and from RTÉ, what really has changed? Once again, the Minister in charge of all of this, Deputy O'Donovan, knows nothing. All of this latest debacle is news to him. This morning he brought legislation to Cabinet to put the broadcaster under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General. This is years after the Committee of Public Accounts said that should happen; it is Government in slow motion. The Irish public bailed out RTÉ to the tune of €725 million, almost three quarters of a billion euro. That is a lot of taxpayers' money. However, there is little evidence of the change that people expected. Top management still plays fast and loose, not reporting accurately the big salaries of the high-flyers. Why is this? It is because the Government has failed to take on the prevailing culture of arrogance and privilege. The privileges gifted by the Government to RTÉ stands in stark contrast to how it treats working people and families. The budget of €9.4 billion last October left working people worse off, forced to watch every euro they spend, with their backs to the wall trying to keep up with rising prices, and doing all of the right things but still struggling to just get by. There is no bailout for them and no help from the Government but RTÉ top management is handed €750 million in public money and continues to take the taxpayers for fools. We have here a tale of two Irelands, with working people playing by the rules abandoned by the Government and told to tighten their belts, and top brass executives at RTÉ who believe the rules do not apply to them and believe they can do what they want without consequence. This needs to be nipped in the bud. The Government needs to sort this out, and fast. Rinne muintir na hÉireann RTÉ a tharrtháil le €725 milliún. Masla amach is amach is ea an chonspóid is déanaí d’oibrithe atá ag streachailt is ag comhaireamh gach uile phingin. Bringing RTÉ under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General is long overdue but it cannot stop there. People want accountability and consequences. Does the Taoiseach accept that the Government's failure to act decisively has allowed this bad behaviour at RTÉ and this culture of entitlement to continue?

Hear, hear.

I do not agree with Deputy McDonald's assertions once again. No matter what any State agency does, or what anybody out there does, she will blame the Government. That is her standard practice. The Government is at fault for everything. Her latest assertion is that the Government must now run RTÉ. Just think about that and reflect on it. Is that what Deputy McDonald is actually saying, that politicians should go in there and run the national public service broadcaster? That is what she is saying.

You give them money and then run away.

I know she has to do this for electoral reasons and politics and to play the game but there is a serious undercurrent here, and coming from the Sinn Féin Party it will create its own challenges in good time and I want to put that on the record. I would say what has happened is unacceptable. The Minister has had a meeting, or will meet, the director general today. Deputy McDonald made a comment on the legislation. The Minister brought it before Cabinet today. Again, she implied that he was at fault for the delay in bringing the legislation. That is not true.

Whose job is it to bring legislation?

Could you afford the Taoiseach the respect that your leader got?

The Oireachtas pre-legislative scrutiny took a considerable length of time. Deputy McDonald's party and members were involved in this legitimately. Please do not come in here, after taking time on pre-legislative scrutiny, and then say the Minister is acting in slow motion.

We brought forward the legislation a few years ago.

That is the kind of dishonesty that characterises every one of her presentations here in recent times on Leaders' Questions. She does not really care about the truth any more. Whenever something breaks out, let us have a go at the Government and let us blame the Government and that is it. It is a simple formula and that is what Deputy McDonald is about. I do not believe the current management is laissez-faire. I do think it wants to get to grips with this. That is my assessment, and I think the board does as well. Yes, everybody knew Derek Mooney was a presenter and not a producer. Deputy McDonald said the dogs on the street knew it but I would say that the dogs in the wild knew it-----

Deputies, please.

-----in terms of his role. There may be others. What this speaks to is a lack of structure in terms of how people are recruited, designated and treated from a human resource point of view in RTÉ. The wider issue that the bonnet needs to be lifted on is whether there is consistency across the organisation in respect of the treatment of people and the treatment of employees of the company. There is a real disparity in terms of how some are treated compared to how others have been treated, and this is a problem for RTÉ that needs to be sorted out. There needs to be far more transparency than we have experienced in recent years in terms of this issue. In terms of the funding issue, collectively, as an Oireachtas, we need to make up our mind on whether or not we want public service broadcasting and a national broadcaster. These are options that politics can take. We can decide to abandon public service broadcasting altogether and just have a free for all. I do not agree with that but just saying that when Deputy McDonald has a go at the €700 million, there are choices facing the Government. You either cut it down, undermine it, let it go to waste or let it go private. What is the Deputy saying? Is she saying the €700 million should not have gone into it?

There should be accountability.

That is rhetorical, Deputy.

I fully agree with that, and that is what the Minister is doing. It is going to the C and AG, and it will be before the public accounts committee. It took some time to get through the Houses, but the Minister is doing that. It took some time because of you guys, rightly. I have no issue with pre-legislative scrutiny, but you cannot blame the Minister for delays with pre-legislative scrutiny. They cannot do that. They cannot get away with that kind of stuff and I am not going to let them get away with it. An rud is tábhachtaí ná go mbeidh soiléiriú ann maidir le RTÉ ar chúrsaí pá, costais, caighdeáin, agus coinníollacha a bhaineann leis sin, agus go bhfuil cothrom na Féinne á tabhairt do gach éinne atá ag obair laistigh de RTÉ. Tá sé sin ríthábhachtach. Táimid den tuairim go gcaithfidh RTÉ sin a dhéanamh agus táim muiníneach as an Aire go bhfuil seisean go láidir den tuairim sin chomh maith.

Unfortunately, the Taoiseach is very touchy about the idea that he might be expected to do his job and do it competently. A key function of the Government is to ensure that State agencies, including RTÉ, are accountable and that an agency such as RTÉ, which has been bailed out to the tune of almost three quarters of a billion euro, behaves in a manner that is transparent and appropriate, so we do not see a rerun of the scandals that rocked RTÉ a short time ago. All of us were led to believe that the bargain with RTÉ was that it would be bailed out and funded and that public broadcasting would be supported and, by way of return, that there would be a change in behaviour and culture, appropriate standards and accurate and transparent reporting. We now know that is not the case and-----

Time is up, Deputy. I ask the Taoiseach to respond.

-----that is on the Taoiseach and the "I don't know what's going on" Minister, Deputy Patrick Donovan-----

The Deputy's time is up and the Taoiseach will respond.

-----who apparently shrugged his shoulders and did a Manuel on it. He knows nothing apparently. He needs to start finding out.

The Minister has brought through the legislation that will bring RTÉ under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General, which is a stronger regime of public accountability for RTÉ than has been the case hitherto. There has always been sensitivity in the relationship between the political system and RTÉ. In the midst of all the turmoil and noise, we need to keep an eye on that too. It will go before the public accounts committee. Deputy Carthy can laugh away because it would be of no concern to him.

Stop it, would you?

If he could run RTÉ, he would run it in the interests of his party. That is how you guys operate and would operate.

Wise up. What sort of child are you?

The point I am making is that the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, is meeting with the director general and the chairman of RTÉ today. I believe they are making a sincere effort to try to get this reorganised. There has been some progress made but what has happened is unacceptable. What is more important is that there is consistency across the board in RTÉ in terms of how people are treated from a human resources point of view and that rights and conditions apply to everybody in RTÉ and not just some.

It sounds like you want to run RTÉ, not Matt Carthy.

Before I call Deputy Bacik, I remind Members to respect everybody's contributions. They are of equal importance.

I welcome Austin Appelbee and his family. Austin, you inspired us all with your immense courage. Well done. In March, reports emerged of mass evictions across the country as a result of the new Fianna Fáil rent law. When I raised this with the Taoiseach at the time he told me that the facts did not bear out any connection. However, the latest figures from the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, confirm exactly what we previously warned him about. The botched so-called rental reforms have indeed triggered what has now become a wave of evictions. In the first three months of this year alone, more than 7,000 eviction notices were issued, which is a 50% increase from last year. These figures should not come as a shock. They are the inevitable consequence of the Government's policies. It gave private landlords a year's notice that they could jack up rents, but only if they got rid of existing tenants before the end of March. Families and children are suffering as a result. Threshold has supported more than 10,000 households in the first three months of this year alone. That is 3% of all households in the private rented sector in just 12 weeks. Behind every notice to quit is a person or family living in utter fear. Out in Galway and Dublin over recent weeks I have met renters in tears as they wonder where they will go next, like the family I met in Cabra of two parents, both working, and two teenage children. They have spent the past 18 months in cramped conditions in a homeless hub because they simply cannot find anywhere to rent or buy. I have spoken before about our Labour representatives' experience of meeting renters contemplating suicide because their situation is so utterly desperate. People need hope and they need Government action to resolve the housing crisis. What action has the Government taken? It rushed deeply flawed legislation through, guillotined the debate, ignored multiple amendments from Labour's Deputy Conor Sheehan and other Opposition parties and the Taoiseach literally scoffed at us in the Chamber when we warned this measure was effectively an incentive to evict and an amnesty on rent hikes. The Tánaiste even told me the measure, in his words, actually "protects renters"? However, what kind of protections are these for renters who have already endured more than a decade of failure from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, where rents have more than doubled in ten years? This is before the full impact of the Government's market reset and rent hikes to come. The Taoiseach said last weekend that the defining challenge of our time is to give hope to young people that they can find an affordable home, but his policies are leading to thousands of young people being evicted from their homes. He has achieved the highest level of evictions since the Famine, the highest level of child homelessness ever and he has nothing to offer renters. Unlike him, we have put forward constructive proposals. We have published legislation for an emergency three-year eviction ban. Will the Taoiseach support Labour's Bill and will he intervene to stop the tsunami of evictions and keep children out of homelessness?

I again do not accept the full presentation because the Deputy is being somewhat disingenuous. She attacked the rent reforms. By the way the whole reform of that was advised in the first instance by the Housing Commission and she urged us to implement its recommendations. That is the first point, and it did need to be reformed and the reforms have added protection for tenants. One of the outcomes of that is, in terms of those who are objecting to the six years, that some landlords opted out but there is always a churn in terms of tenancies, landlords and so on and there is a higher number, over 13,000-----

People being evicted onto the street is not "churn".

-----who have actually entered the market. As some people exit the market, more enter the market and it needed to be sorted and to be solidified as well, and the Deputy knows that. Her objection was she tried to portray it as an incentive to developers and landlords but it is the protection elements of the reforms that have caused some smaller landlords, perhaps, to exit. She cannot have it both ways.

The Taoiseach cannot have it both ways.

No, I am sorry; the Deputy cannot have it both ways. We need to have a settled landscape out to the next decade or so in terms of the investment side of the equation to get more in. The bottom line is 36,000 homes were delivered last year, which is the highest since records began and up 20% on 2024. A total of 38,000 new dwellings were completed in the 12 months ending quarter 1 of 2026, which is an increase of 26 year on year. Since 2020, about 177,000 units have been built. Planning momentum is very strong, with 8,000 permission in quarter 4 of 2025, which is up by close to 20%. Some 20,000 houses were granted permission in 2025, which is the highest number since 2009, and there were 8,400 commencement notices in quarter 1 of 2026, which is up 184% year on year. Real dwelling investment is up 19.4% in the first three quarters of 2025. Construction employment was at 191,900 at the end of 2025. That is up 30% since 2019 and 12% year on year. The HBFI loan book grew 25% in 2025. We allocated €1 billion to the housing infrastructure investment fund. Residential planning permissions in Dublin exceed 78,000 units. Some 24,246 apartments are under construction or on active sites across Dublin. There were 50 new schemes active during quarter 1 of this year alone. In total, 31,936 homes were either built or under construction across 202 active sites in quarter 1 of 2026. That is evidence of very significant momentum within the housing area and supply is the key. On social, affordable-----

Thank you, Taoiseach. Deputy Bacik to respond.

-----and cost rental, the increases are happening across the board.

With respect, what I have heard from the Taoiseach just now is Alice in Wonderland logic or Micheál in Wonderland logic. The Taoiseach is telling me the Government has introduced protections for renters and that these have, somehow, generated evictions, so which is it? He made claims about construction figures that he needs to go back and look at again. He used the word “churn”. That is deeply hurtful to those families, like the family I described, like the family I met in Oranmore, and like families we are all meeting all the time. I hear that the Taoiseach is telling members of his own parliamentary party that there is a wonderful response on the doors in the by-election, but he must know this is not the case. That is more Alice in Wonderland thinking. All across the country, all of us who are constituency TDs are hearing from people who are desperately hurt, who are in fear and who are getting notices to quit and have nowhere to go. The figures speak for themselves and the stories behind the figures speak for themselves, no matter how much the Taoiseach tries to spin it and no matter how much he lectures me about "churn" in this House. He said it in March. He is saying it again now.

I thank the Deputy. I call the Taoiseach to respond.

It is not the case for people living the reality-----

The time is up, Deputy. I call the Taoiseach.

People enter the market and people leave the market continuously, and have done so. The Deputy knows that. It is just a fact. The bottom line is that she cannot spin away either and pretend that nothing is happening in terms of housing supply.

No.

Over 9,000 social houses were built last year. Those were direct builds that the State funded. Housing is the number one issue facing the people of the country. Our population has grown exponentially, and if we dig deep under the demographics and the population figures, we can see the impact on the pressures on the housing situation because of the different parts of that demographics story. I can deal with that at a later time. We need to increase housing supply, and this is what the Government is focused on in a whole range of initiatives that we have introduced, from social housing to cost-rental to affordable housing. There are a significant number of drawdowns for first-time buyers, for example. It is much higher than it was back in 2015, when the percentage of first-time buyers was 26% of all household buyers.

I thank the Taoiseach.

It is now 40% in 2026.

The time is up. I call Deputy Holly Cairns.

We need it to happen faster-----

Time is up. I call Deputy Holly Cairns.

I express my condolences to the family and friends of Yves Sakila. A video circulating online of an incident before his death is deeply disturbing. There must be a full, comprehensive and transparent investigation into what happened. Yesterday, Israel committed yet another blatant breach of international law. The Israel Defense Forces, IDF, boarded a flotilla in international waters and again kidnapped humanitarian activists, including 12 Irish citizens. They took this action not because the flotilla posed any kind of threat, but to stop humanitarian aid reaching a starving population in Gaza. The activists on the flotilla were kidnapped for simply trying to bring them food, medicine and baby formula. Among those kidnapped was one of my constituents, Tom Deasy from Clonakilty, as well as the President's sister, Dr. Margaret Connolly, a Sligo GP. Twelve Irish citizens, including the sister of our Head of State, have been illegally detained. It is completely unprecedented, not that we would have known this from the Government’s response, because it took it 12 hours to issue a four-line statement about it. This is not just deeply disappointing; this is utterly pathetic. For more than two years, we have heard daily reports of Palestinian people being killed, injured and illegally detained. Meanwhile, settler violence in the West Bank is at record levels, with Palestinian villages and homes being razed to the ground. Yet, there have still been no sanctions against Israel and, crucially, no enactment of the occupied territories Bill, despite the Government's big commitments when it was electioneering. I believe that lack of action from this Government is what has driven the Irish citizens on the flotilla to take action themselves and leave their families to board boats in the full awareness that they will likely be illegally captured by the IDF, with their safety not guaranteed. I spoke to Tom Deasy’s sister, Ciara, this morning. Her family believe he will be forcibly transferred to a port in Palestinian territories in the next two hours. They have got no word on his safety and they will not until Israel decides to share that information. Israel holds all the power because it knows there are no consequences for its actions. The past two years have shown us all that. Ciara told me how worried sick she is but, more than that, how proud she is of her brother. She said: The people on the flotilla have been shouting for Palestine for a long time now and that. Now it's time to shout for them in order to get people in power to act. The Taoiseach is one of those people. He has the power to stop munitions going through our airspace, to stop the trade of dual-use goods and to enact the occupied territories Bill. He has the power to act so why will he not?

First, I extend my deepest sympathies to the family of Mr. Sakila. The full circumstances of what happened there need to be examined and investigated fully and thoroughly. I understand that Fiosrú has been notified and is involved in that as an independent statutory body. The situation is deeply concerning and very concerning to many people who witnessed it. I just want to make that point but obviously we cannot pre-empt the outcome of any investigation. In respect of the Israeli action against the Sumud flotilla in international waters and the detention of those onboard, I strongly condemn what the Israeli Government has done and I condemn the action of the Israeli military forces, as I have done previously and as we did very early on. The Deputy's picky attitude to timing is just wrong and unnecessary. We will engage and are engaging with the Israeli Government on the release of all Irish citizens who have been wrongfully detained by the Israeli military in international waters. It is unacceptable behaviour. Let me be clear: the humanitarian situation in Gaza is equally unacceptable and has been for quite some time. Very often what tends to happen is people very quickly pivot away from attacking the Israeli Government and want to attack the Irish Government more than attacking the Israeli Government. That seems to be the standard course of action here which I do not think adds a whole lot to trying to help the overall situation in Palestine. Most Palestinians I meet and when I meet the Palestinian Authority or people in the area, they are very appreciative of successive actions the Irish Government has taken on this question. We have given a lot of support to the Palestinian people and rightly so. We will have allocated about €144 million by the end of 2026 in support of the Palestinian people. That is not insignificant. We have consistently supported UNRWA and have given €68 million since 2023. We intervened in South Africa's International Court of Justice, ICJ, case against Israel under the Genocide Convention. We made a submission to the ICJ on the legal consequences of Israel's actions in the occupied territories. We subsequently co-sponsored a resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly back in 2024, which sought to implement the court's advisory opinion. We recognise Palestine as a sovereign and independent state. We have organised medical evacuations of sick children from Gaza, along with their family members, for treatment, and plans are ongoing for further missions. We have supported over 300 people to leave Gaza and travel to Ireland since the crisis began. We will now work to get those people released and safely home

Asking the Taoiseach to live up to his election promises is not attacking him. That should be the bare minimum. He said that he would enact the occupied territories Bill and all this Government has done for 16 months is find excuses to delay it. Back and forth to the Attorney General, over and over again, looking for advice that we know is the same as that from the Attorney General to the previous Government. We know the advice was to go ahead. Now the Government has run out of steam with that excuse so it is going for the need for all of Europe to act. It is excuse after excuse. Words of condemnation are welcome but what I am asking about is action on the occupied territories Bill and on the divestment Bill. There are so many actions that this Government could take and the brave point that the people on board the flotilla are making is that there needs to be action, not just words. Like Tom's sister said, it is time for the Taoiseach to use his voice and power to do something about this instead of people continuing to feel that they need to put their own lives at risk to try to get aid into Gaza.

I disagree with the Deputy's fundamental premise on this issue. People know my voice on Gaza and the Middle East. They know it in the European Union, both on the Foreign Affairs Council, when I was Minister for Foreign Affairs, and back in 2007, when I went to Gaza. I do not really need lectures from the Deputy in terms of my sincerity about Gaza.

Where is the occupied territories Bill?

I appreciate what those on the flotilla are doing. If we passed the occupied territories Bill in the morning, there would still be a flotilla, and I understand why there would be. Earlier, I listed all that has been done. If we look back at the debate before we did the recognition and before we intervened in the South African case, all the Deputies opposite were saying, "If only you would do this, it will achieve a fundamental change in Israel's position". We did all of that. We did so for the right reasons, because we think it is the right thing to do. Has it impacted on Israeli behaviour? Let us be honest: it has not. The Minister will progress the occupied territories Bill-----

We have been waiting years for that.

-----but will it change Israel's position? That is the key issue.

There have been no sanctions.

The time is up, a Thaoisigh.

Globally, there must be an international alliance of countries to really put pressure on Israel.

The time is up.

I respectfully suggest that is the way to proceed.

Deputy Stanley might indulge me, before I call him, in saying that although we welcomed Austin Appelbee earlier, he has just arrived into the Chamber. I ask that we give him a round of applause. He has been highly commended by Members and he and his family are most welcome.

I raise again with the Taoiseach the three public dental schemes. He will recall me raising them with him on Leaders' Questions last year. The three schemes - the dental treatment services scheme, the dental treatment benefit scheme and the school dental scheme - are in chaos and are not functioning. The situation with the school dental scheme in County Laois, for example, is worse now than it was last year when I raised it with the Taoiseach. It is like the Dark Ages. Current figures from the HSE show that there are 6,618 children on the school dental scheme waiting list for a first examination. That is an increase of 175 since I raised the issue last year. Of that number, 818 are seven years overdue an examination. Some are not getting their first examination until they are in fifth year in secondary school. There is huge harm done in the meantime, with serious tooth decay and other problems arising. Those 818 children should be seen in fourth class. The HSE is now changing its tune and marking them for examination from sixth year, but it accepts they should be seen in third or fourth class. Those 818 pupils are seven full years overdue for examination. A total of 1,504 children are six years overdue for examination and 1,520 are five years overdue. They are adults before they are seen for their first examination, which should happen in fourth class. The Government is failing the children of Laois. It is failing those in other counties as well but Laois is a particular black spot. The dental treatment services scheme is for medical card patients. I told the Taoiseach last year that the scheme has collapsed in Laois. It is still flat on the floor, being non-existent in almost all of the county. There still is just one dentist from Carlow providing a service in the community centre in Killeshin on the border of Laois and Carlow. No other practice in the county is taking medical card patients under the dental treatment services scheme. It is an absolute scandal that medical cardholders are without a service in Laois. Meanwhile, eight dentists are doing it in Offaly and a further eight are being recruited. I welcome that fact - if there are 16 there, that is good - having raised the situation in Offaly with the Taoiseach previously when the county was part of my constituency. What is the Government doing to address the situation in Laois? The dental treatment benefit scheme, which is PRSI-based, has little or no substance. All people get is an examination and polish. Low- and middle-income workers and their families are being failed. Despite paying thousands of euro in tax, PRSI and USC every year, they cannot even get an extraction or a filling. Those workers and their families deserve better. We are way behind other countries when it comes to public dental services. We have failed people. As I said, we are in the Dark Ages. There are other health problems caused by lack of dental care, such as stomach ulcers, gum disease and even a greater risk of blood poisoning. Will the Taoiseach and the Minister for Health, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, take action now to address this?

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. I acknowledge that there are very significant difficulties and challenges with the dental treatment medical scheme and dental healthcare more generally in terms of the poor capacity in the public sector side of dental treatment. The preponderance of people has been towards the private sector and the difficulty in terms of recruitment and establishing a comprehensive structure within the dental public health service has proven problematic for quite some time. There have been negotiations with the IDA and the Department of Health and there has been additional funding allocated. The Deputy is aware of the impact of that in County Offaly. I do not have the specifics of County Laois per se, but it seems to me, and I will speak to the Minister about this, that we need a more fundamental re-examination of how we provide dental services in the future in the most efficient and effective way that meets the needs of those who require such treatment, and what is the best mechanism for doing that. The existing approaches and more traditional approaches of the past have not borne fruit in terms of where dentists choose to operate or tend to do their practise and so on. That is a difficulty. I will ask the Minister to engage with the Deputy in respect of the situation in County Laois more specifically because he raised that. Overall, dental health has improved fairly significantly. The public health side of dental health has been positive in terms of the basics people need to adhere to, but for those requiring treatment, many are waiting too long, particularly for orthodontics.

The Taoiseach does not have the specifics for County Laois, but I have given them to him. Most of the statistics I gave him are only a week old. The three public schemes are in crisis. I did not get to raise the boy with special needs I mentioned to the Taoiseach, the Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, and previous Ministers. After six years of waiting in severe pain with periodontal disease, severe inflammation and bone loss, he has to be treated under anaesthetic in hospitals. I have raised this a number of times. Only now is he getting an appointment for a consultation. That gives the Taoiseach the scale of this. Three dental schemes need to be fixed; that is key. Will the Taoiseach now step up recruitment in Laois? There is a particular problem in County Laois. The number of people in training places in dentistry has to be increased. We have to ensure there is active engagement between HSE management and dentists in County Laois to ascertain why private dentists are not taking them on. There are eight doing this in Offaly, which is good, but-----

The Taoiseach to respond, the Deputy’s time is up.

Will the Taoiseach now employ more HSE dentists to fill the gaps?

I call the Taoiseach.

There has to be more public dentists to fill those gaps. That is the message I want to get out.

The preponderence of people are moving more into the private sector. That is the reality. However, I take the Deputy’s point. There are ongoing reviews and discussions on this between the Minister and representative organisations. Recruitment has been ongoing and additional funding has been allocated over the past two to three years. I do not have the specifics on County Laois; I know the Deputy does. I will ask the Minister to engage with him in respect of County Laois specifically. In terms of prioritisation, those with special needs should get first priority in terms of interventions.