Micheál Martin

We have legislation-----

I am not going to arbitrate in terms of professional advice and expertise on how to operate various schemes. Everybody is coming in now with solutions to every single issue from a technical point of view. We have established agencies to deal with standards, technical aspects and the remediation of the homes. This is a legislative assembly, not the national building standards agency. The agencies h…

An evidence-based approach is always to be recommended, and we should measure. People should begin to measure the impact of severe heat. We have not had too many heatwaves. That is the sense anyway. People are amazed this week by the heat. It is a serious matter. We are looking at 40°C across the water tomorrow. That is very serious from a health and climate point of view. We need to start adjusti…

I presume we are talking about the Department of agriculture.

I am not familiar with the first case but it seems extraordinary that a report would have been started in 1990 and it is now 2026, so that is 36 years that a report has not been published. I will check that and get a response from the Department of agriculture as quickly as I can. On the second case, I will check in terms of correspondence. It is not ringing a bell right now. It may have, but we …

I want to get the information so people can check this. I will obviously have to check the provenance of the correspondence and try to get a response.

I have also met Grace's parents, who have been through a very traumatic and harrowing experience but have also articulated how communities are impacted by scrambling. The legislation is very clear. Scramblers cannot be on the public roads and there are significant additional powers there. There was a recent case in the courts involving a garda. My understanding is that the Minister is going to bri…

The steering group has been established under the chairmanship of my office and officials from my office will co-ordinate across all Departments. The cultural and artistic dimension will be the strongest dimension of the building itself and of the GPO. The Government approved this only yesterday, following a lot of work. We need to get it right. Sometimes what becomes interim becomes permanent too…

The proposed restriction on lead ammunition is being developed at the level of the European Union under the REACH regulation, which aims to protect human health and the environment from harmful chemical exposure. The proposal is intended primarily to reduce lead pollution from spent ammunition and to protect wild birds, hunters and their families from the harmful effects of lead exposure. The Depa…

I hear the Deputy. Having read the reply, I know what is going on in the sense-----

I will revert to the Deputy.

This is a very serious issue and I will take it up with the Minister for justice. I will talk to the Minister in respect of this issue and work to see if we can make progress on it, which I think we can.

I appreciate the work that Sharon Lynn and Bryan Gallagher are doing. Courts often respond negatively to mandatory guidelines from the Oireachtas but, nonetheless, it is something I will ask the Minister for justice to explore, in terms of manslaughter and male-on-male violence. More broadly, within our education system and the criminal justice system, we should focus on violence more generally. W…

This is a general issue, not one that just applies to County Louth. What the Minister for public expenditure would say is that all county councils will have received funding that involved a provision for emergencies. That said, submissions have been made from county councils across the country, particularly those that were more affected than others by Storm Chandra. The Government is giving consi…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 20, inclusive, together. The Cabinet committee on water quality oversees the implementation of programme for Government commitments in relation to issues affecting Ireland's water, including those related to agriculture, forestry, land-use change and wastewater treatment. Water quality is vital to the well-being of our society, economy and environment. The p…

Did the Deputy say 50 years?

I would love a swim now. I will not get one.

I am working too hard all day and will not get the chance. The Deputies have all made me very envious. Everyone is going swimming and we are in here. We should reflect. Deputy ‘Chap’ Cleere made a very valid point in terms of Mullinavat and Inistioge. I have been saying this to Irish Water. As the Deputy knows, one of the outcomes of our discussions has been developer-led treatment plants. There …

My experience in life is that the engineer or person on the ground might know an awful lot more than the corporates in terms of specific pipes and so on. I will pursue it and I will raise the fact that the Deputy has raised it with me. Deputy Connolly has a sensible proposal. The bathing season of June to September does not make sense any more. Particularly since Covid, an awful lot more people s…

It makes absolute sense to carry out testing, particularly in rural towns and villages, during the festive season and the winter when there are many swimming events, such as on Christmas Day, new year's eve and new year's day. A lot of people gather in those areas for those events. It is a very good point. I will get the Minister to send a circular to the local authorities on that. Deputy Cullin…

We have a number of areas where things are not taken in charge. These things should be facilitated by the agencies. I got the message from Deputy Boyd Barrett but he went from tropical weather to torrential rainfall within one minute.

Within three days.

I am trying to work out when the torrential rainfall was but the point is well made. There is a fundamental issue there and that is why we are putting €2.5 billion into this to do some very substantial wastewater infrastructure. Dublin is one of the areas that is probably most impacted because of the access to the coast, the huge population and so on. Deputy Paul Murphy essentially made the same …

I will examine it with Irish Water. They make a very good black pudding in Newport as well, by the way.

I will certainly look into it and check with Irish Water as to why. It might be an operational or planning issue. I do not know but I will check with them.