Micheál Martin

The Deputy seems very confused in her presentations on the rental market. On one level, she is complaining about evictions she suggests are caused by recent reforms of the rental market, which were all about protecting tenants and the six-year term. Which is it?

If the Deputy banned evictions, she would cause greater churn and a greater loss of landlords. The facts do not bear out what she said. The latest RTB data shows continued growth in quarter 4 of last year with 243,598 tenancies, the highest on record. There were 104,687 private landlords, broadly unchanged year on year. Churn is normal but overall numbers are stable and, actually, rising. A total …

-----for larger landlords, places stronger restrictions on tenancy termination and caps rent increases at inflation.

The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission is there to ensure fair play in the marketplace. The Government certainly will be keeping a very watchful eye on this issue. If there is not pass-through, that will have implications for any potential future measures we might take in the energy market itself. We will be keeping a weathervane eye on this in the coming days. I take the Deputy's poin…

I will check with the Minister of State with responsibility for special education in respect of that report and timelines for its publication. There is forward planning now. We brought forward the date by which parents and students apply for places in our schools. That has happened this year, as the Deputy must be aware. The establishment of a central database has to happen but I acknowledge it is…

I thank the Deputy for raising what is a very important issue. I will talk to the Ministers for health and enterprise and others who can have an impact. It is a very serious issue because fake drugs can do real harm to people and damage their health. It is an area that perhaps needs a higher profile focus. I will certainly take away the fact the Deputy has highlighted the issue. I will come back …

The Government has welcomed the agreement and will be supporting it at EU level. Ireland's agrifood exports will benefit under the deal through easier access to the large Australian market. We believe this will give us more opportunities to sell our products due to tariff elimination. Tariffs will go down to zero on key EU export products such as cheese over three years. There will be recognition …

I do not have the background to the specific case. Core funding now exceeds €436 million, up 62% since 2022, with 93%, or 4,590, of providers signed up, which keeps fees at 2021 levels. I will speak to the Minister on this. It is a matter that is kept under constant review. As the Deputy said, we do not want to lose anybody from the core funding framework. People may feel they can do better outsid…

Again, I do not have the full background to the case here. Obviously, the Government has funded the building very well. The hot school meals programme has been rolled out very quickly and effectively on many fronts. There is a lot of debate around improving nutrition. However, fundamentally over the last three years, it has been rolled out at considerable pace across the length and breadth of the …

I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. The haulage industry is a key industry whose role in our modern economy has been underestimated in terms of getting goods from ports to shelves and from manufacturing facilities to the ships for our export markets. I am very interested in making sure that we have a sustainable haulage industry into the future. The Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, has enga…

The Minister has sought submissions from local authorities across the length and breadth of the country in respect of damage done in recent storms and flooding that occurred. The Minister is assessing those submissions now with a view to allocations to try to help the county councils concerned.

First, I did not decline to answer any question, and it is wrong of the Deputy to suggest that I did. She knows full well that questions about hospital sites go to the Minister for Health.

I am sorry, no, I am not responsible for every individual Minister's decision-making. It is a well-known practice in the Dáil and the Oireachtas that questions go to the Minister who is accountable to the House in respect of the matter. Of course, I was aware of the decision, and the Minister would have informed me very early on, along with the Tánaiste, the Minister of State, Seán Canney, and oth…

Yes, but it is positive overall for healthcare, I would have thought.

I am responding to the issue. I met with the Before We Die group some weeks ago. This is on the agenda of the next Cabinet subcommittee on disability. I have spoken to the Minister for housing, the Minister for disability and the Minister for Health. What is needed here is a concerted, collective approach. I acknowledge that the current situation is not sustainable or satisfactory and creates undu…

I do not have the background to this. I learned to swim in the sea, actually, down in west Cork, or maybe Robert's Cove or somewhere like that, but we had a baths long ago. We used to call it the baths, the swimming pool-----

-----next to City Hall, and the craic was good. I passionately believe in swimming opportunities for young people and children in particular to learn how to swim, as Deputy Smith says, because water safety is essential and it can be a very joyous and healthy discipline for the rest of your life.

I will talk to the Minister, Deputy O'Brien. He is fairly innovative when it comes to projects in Fingal. I will see what can be done. I take the Deputy's point. The Minister of State with responsibility for sport is here. We will see what can be done in respect of the roof on the swimming pool in Portmarnock.

There has been a HSE review of the insourcing programme and practice. There has been huge investment since 2025. The Minister undertook a detailed survey of all insourcing activities within the HSE in light of concerns about an over-reliance in the system on supplementary capacity. That report was submitted and published by the Minister in July of last year. That led to a number of measures being …

I will talk to the Minister about it. What the Deputy has said sometimes illustrates - I will not say the futility of asking parliamentary questions, but you do tend to get standard replies from time to time. That was last February. The Minister has a huge capital budget. I am not saying capital is required here. I will talk to the Minister about this. I would be favourably disposed to it. Anythin…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 10, inclusive, together. On 24 February, I attended an online meeting of the coalition of the willing to mark the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The meeting was co-chaired by British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, and the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, and was joined also by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, as we…

It is the wrong area to ask about. We are on the coalition of the willing here.

The question relates to my attendance at the meeting of the coalition of the willing. It is striking that quite a number of Members just avoided any reference to my attendance at that meeting, which is illustrative, and not really good enough. If specific questions are tabled, we should concentrate on those during Taoiseach's Questions because we have the Order of Business for half an hour or 40 m…

That is not obtuse. That is a fact. Sinn Féin has opposed the €90 billion.

I want to finish my point. There is a view abroad-----