Micheál Martin

Yes, I know, but we tend to give everyone a bad name.

I thank the Deputy for raising this question. I want to acknowledge his absolute consistent support and adherence to a high-quality food production system in this country and agriculture. At the moment, the European Union currently imports around 200,000 tonnes of beef from Mercosur countries annually. What is being proposed now is that the Mercosur countries will be granted a beef quota of 99,000…

I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. My understanding, if it is the same issue, is that it arose prior to the budget and the then Minister for Finance, Paschal Donohoe, advised that, as we say in Irish, níl aon dul as. There was no way to deal with it other than to bring in new measures because of European Union monitoring and what it had assessed in terms of the existing scheme. I accept it …

As I said earlier, I am very concerned about these reports. The European Union currently imports approximately 200,000 tons of beef from Mercosur countries annually. There was an assessment done some years ago on the proposed EU-Mercosur agreement that it would result in an additional 50,000 tonnes once it was fully phased in, but approximately 99,000 tonnes would benefit from an in-quota tariff o…

The EU has very stringent SPS standards and they have to be implemented and enforced.

Our standards are among the highest in the world. It is interesting that in other trade deals some of the countries did not manage to export too much into Europe because of the SPS standards, which are often described as non-tariff barriers.

I thank the Deputy. I am very conscious of this issue. He has been advocating, as has Deputy Shane Moynihan who has been hotfoot onto me in respect of the timelines for this. DART+ South West is part of the broader DART programme. I will speak to the Minister. Permission was granted in November of last year. All of the benefits are there in terms of increasing capacity. We will work with the Minis…

I thank Deputy Connolly. That is too long a time. We should know what is happening with particular sites. I would have thought that if the NTA or Galway City Council has possession, it should engage with the other council and make the site available. I do not know the full details but there are always ways of getting things done. Park and ride facilities do matter and they can be of significant va…

Obviously the identification of centres has been very problematic and challenging for communities and for the Government. I am not sure the appellation of "waste" can be applied to it in this context. The context is much different in terms of ordinarily procuring or acquiring buildings. I will talk to the Minister in respect of the site and seek an update in respect of it.

I will engage with the HSE to bring the clarity the Deputy requires in respect of St. Brigid's Hospital and the centre there. Facilities should be used in terms of primary care. Again, I will have to engage with the HSE in respect of this to bring further clarity to it and get an updated position.

As I said earlier, a national policy and strategy in respect of migration is being developed. I object to the conflation of racism and attacks on people because of their ethnic background and the Government's position. That is wrong.

It is wrong to do it. These attacks occurred long before anything was announced this week or this month. It is not good enough that the Deputy would make those assertions. There is nothing wrong with a proper legal system of entering into the country.

Sorry, it is not about mixed messages. It has always been the case that asylum is treated through the asylum system. People have never been allowed to work immediately when they are seeking asylum. It is not as if there is an open door; there is not and there never has been. Even though we were criticised by the far right for having an open door, there never was an open-door system in terms of asy…

There have been work permits and freedom of movement within the European Union, which are all very positive.

Again, there has been extensive consultation with the NTA on BusConnects across the country in Dublin, in Cork and everywhere. We have been strongly making the case to the NTA to engage with and listen to the public and society more generally. This new scheme has been in operation for four weeks. I understand there is a meeting tomorrow with the NTA and the local public representatives, is there n…

Okay. We can deal with it then. The Deputy should engage with the NTA tomorrow.

I am not disagreeing with the Deputy; I just think that tomorrow is a good opportunity to bring the views of the people to the NTA.

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. He is correct when he says that this is a very serious issue. Access to the GMS in dental capacities is very restrictive. I will talk to the Minister for Health in respect of this. My understanding is that Cork university dental hospital used to take public patients in the past. That was always the tradition. I will certainly pursue that specific issue wi…

Certainly, Deputy. I will have to discuss this with the Ministers for education and public expenditure to see what the issue is and whether it is ready to go. It is an ASD wing. We have put a lot of capital into special education in the past year or two to get more special classes built and so on. I will check with the Minister what is holding it up. The Deputy will have my support in trying to pr…

More generally, Dublin has benefited significantly in the past year or two in terms of an increase in garda numbers. There may be specific geographic areas-----

The Deputy is focused on Dublin West. There is no question that the city centre has benefited hugely. That has had an impact. The good news is that numbers are increasing. The last intake into Templemore - 220 - was the highest ever. I was with the Minister, Deputy O'Callaghan, in Templemore recently when approximately 190 gardaí came out and passed through. In various parts of the country, includ…

First of all, I do not accept the premise upon which the Deputy is basing her question. We do not govern via opinion polls, nor could we do so. We should not-----

I am making a fundamental point here. Is the Deputy is seriously suggesting that the Government should react to every opinion poll on every specific issue in the country? Sure we would have chaos.

On the issue itself, I think the Deputy has brought legislation forward. We will examine that. All the parties will examine that legislation, as I have said. I think we have submitted a timed amendment on it. That is the approach that the political parties are taking.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 12 together. The UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and I both attended the recent G20 Summit in South Africa. We had a number of conversations in the margins of meetings there, including on the situation in Ukraine, on which an informal meeting of the coalition of the willing took place. Previously, I met with Prime Minister Starmer at Chequers on 12 September. …