Micheál Martin

Do I have six minutes remaining?

I will get around to everybody who has asked a question.

It is a new departure if I am going to do a written reply to every oral question. That is not on either.

Deputy Pádraig O'Sullivan raised the Rainbow Club, which is doing exceptional work. Jon and Karen O'Mahony have been exceptional leaders in that regard. The former Minister of State, now Senator Rabbitte, did good work on a service level agreement. I was involved in advocating for that building, which was a HSE building, to be allocated to the Rainbow Club. I will certainly continue to work with t…

The Minister, Deputy Foley, will lead, with the support of the unit in my office, but she will also report to the Cabinet subcommittee, which will then make recommendations to the Cabinet. That is how this will work. The Cabinet subcommittee is very important because all the key Ministers have to be there. I agree with Deputy Cian O'Callaghan that the unemployment levels among the disability comm…

I wish to announce for the information of the Dáil that having informed the President that Dáil Éireann had approved my nomination of Deputy Hildegarde Naughton to be a member of the Government, the President on 18 November 2025 appointed her accordingly. On the same day, I assigned the Department of Finance to the Tánaiste, Deputy Simon Harris, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the …

Ar dtús báire, ní aontaím leis an Teachta. Cuirim fáilte roimh na cuairteoirí in Áiléar na gCuairteoirí Oirirce. Is deas bualadh le leo inniu. Ní aontaím leis an Teachta. Admhaím go bhfuil dualgas ar an Rialtas gach aon tacaíocht is féidir a thabhairt do mhuintir na tíre, go háirithe do dhaoine a bhfuil ioncam íseal acu. Is é sin atá déanta againn sa cháinaisnéis a bhí againn le déanaí. Tá muid ag…

Deputy McDonald had the Liz Truss approach to the energy crisis. She quickly abandoned it as things went pear-shaped in the UK as a result of that particular policy. In regard to the budget, we accept the situation is tough for many households and families out there. Even though inflation is coming down from the high of 2023-----

In terms of where it was, it is coming down. Cop on. In 2021, 2022 and 2023-----

We need to be upfront with people here. The bottom line for us is that in the recent budget we have targeted resources at those most in need. We managed €10 for the pensioners. In terms of fuel, we increased the fuel allowance by €5 a week, from €33 to €38. That is an additional €140 over the fuel season. Fuel allowance now covers 26% of households. That is up from 23%. We have extended the reduce…

-----particularly to help primary schools and special schools as well. We have targeted the resources. Sinn Féin wants to look after millionaires and so on with energy credits. That is its business-----

----but as far as we are concerned, we need to target resources.

Sinn Féin has had a few millionaires in its day across the water, some of them quite dubious by the way, but we will say no more about that.

The other area that we focused on was public services. If we look at the economy now, our expenditure has gone up over 7% as a result of the Estimates in the budget this year. That is significant. Why? Because we are investing in disability services, and we need to. We are investing in child poverty-----

-----with substantial increases in the child support payment, all of which is dealing with those families who are clearly under pressure and who need our resources the most. Sinn Féin has gone for all universal supports and ignoring those with the lowest incomes.

We do not need lectures from the Deputy about who she represents or who we represent. The people on this side of the benches came from working-class backgrounds and got elected as Deputies because they are in touch with people and understand the realities out there.

The Deputy should stop that sort of pretence that she goes on with all of the time. Sinn Féin wants to support those on very high incomes with energy credits.

That is what she said. We decided not to do that. Sinn Féin wanted us to give energy credits to everybody, irrespective of income. Sinn Féin wants to give millionaires and people on €200,000 an energy credit. We have said that we will give child support payments the biggest increase. Children over 12 will get €16 extra a week out of this budget up to €78 a week. Children under 12 will get an incre…

The Deputy had her chance to speak. We made our choices. We prioritised services for people.

I 100% reject Deputy Bacik's false narrative on the Government's position on housing and her vagueness about the Labour Party's position. I sum up the Labour Party's housing policy and the attitude of its members to housing as: whatever the Government proposes, we oppose.

It is extraordinary-----

----that the Deputy gave a big opening critique of overall Government policy and then zeroed in on apartment standards because her party opposes that decision. That is all the Labour Party can do. The Deputy told an untruth when she said that the Government has no social housing targets. She knows full well that the housing plan is very clear-----

Deputy Bacik did say that. She said that we had no social housing plans. The housing plan states that we will deliver 12,000 new social homes every year over the lifetime of the plan. We have significantly transformed the scale and pace of social housing delivery over the past five years. That has to be acknowledged. I have looked at the Labour Party's manifesto on housing. It is so vague as to be…

I did.

I do not.