First of all, no one is wiping anybody out in rural Ireland. It suits the Deputy to create a storm and to spread rumours saying the Government is going to do this and that. Let us get the background to this. Everyone in this House was agreed that housing was the number one priority, or at least I thought it was the number one priority, facing this Dáil at its commencement. The objective in terms of the short-term let…
TDs / Micheál Martin
Micheál Martin
Taoiseach
Portrait: © Houses of the Oireachtas (Oireachtas (Open Data) PSI Licence) · source file
0
questions asked
Members of the Government answer questions rather than ask them
688,766
words spoken in the chamber
686,628 as a minister, 2,138 as a TD
197
votes recorded
Each Yes, No or Abstained in a recorded vote
From the Dáil chamber only: committee meetings are not in this archive.
Members of the Government answer parliamentary questions rather than ask them, so this page lists none of theirs.
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Low months are usually recesses, when the Dáil does not sit. The archive runs to 22 October 2026.
Contributions to debates 6,546 in all
Dec 2024Oct 2026
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| Month | Contributions |
|---|---|
| December 2024 | 11 |
| January 2025 | 6 |
| February 2025 | 438 |
| March 2025 | 518 |
| April 2025 | 317 |
| May 2025 | 426 |
| June 2025 | 424 |
| July 2025 | 344 |
| August 2025 | 0 |
| September 2025 | 146 |
| October 2025 | 375 |
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| February 2026 | 529 |
| March 2026 | 229 |
| April 2026 | 385 |
| May 2026 | 474 |
| June 2026 | 425 |
| July 2026 | 181 |
| August 2026 | 0 |
| September 2026 | 198 |
| October 2026 | 222 |
Debates they spoke in most
Plus 6,426 contributions in the regular slots, such as Leaders' Questions and Priority Questions. Speech from the chair is not counted.
Party, constituency and offices
- constituency Cork South-Central 29 November 2024 to now
- party Fianna Fáil 29 November 2024 to now
- office Taoiseach 23 January 2025 to now
When the Government has a final position, there will be plenty of opportunity for debate in the Dáil. We are not rushing anything in and we are not going to ram anything through. The Deputy needs to be clear as well. Long before any of this happened, change of use always required planning. The Deputy knows that. He is pretending the Government has suddenly invented that. We have not. He has been around meetings and i…
He is saying the Government is going to bring in this draconian law about change of use. Change of use has always been there.
We are very conscious, and have been, of the need to protect regional tourism, rural Ireland and the jobs that go there. That is why we took the population threshold of 20,000. We will be back to the Deputy.
Is the Deputy against Deputy Collins's position?
First, 7,860 children who have applied for special placements in our schools. That is more than twice the number who did so ahead of the current school year. Please acknowledge that. It is because of the earlier date being forward. Six thousand are already enrolled in schools-----
-----and a further 1,400 are preschool-age children. To be very clear, the Government is absolutely committed to meeting the needs of every one of those children. The €646 million approved by the Government is additional to the Estimate that was agreed at budget time. This money is largely to cater for the additionality that has arisen as a result of the change in the system that we brought in with the early date in …
My understanding is that a new regulation has been introduced by the Minister in respect of this in recent months. It is shocking that this would occur. I presume the matter has been referred to the Garda in terms of any fraudulent activity here, because it is absolutely unacceptable that would occur to any student. The Minister has acted on that, but I am sure he would be willing to engage with the Deputy’s represen…
Online fraud is an enormous issue and has been for quite some time. There are regulatory frameworks governing this and obligations governing the companies as well. There is an issue with some of the revenue models of some of the companies in respect of advertising that defames people, for example. There is revenue in that and there is also revenue in the shocking case the Deputy outlined with a young couple being def…
The Deputy loves creating a narrative about every initiative of Government. It is nothing to do with Progress Ireland or anything like that but it is to do with supply. I will be straight-up.
It is not its idea.
Deputies all over this House were advocating for this long before Progress Ireland was ever established. There have been cases in rural Ireland where people have had difficulties with extensions and buildings in their back gardens, fields, or whatever they were attached to, including farmhouses and so on. There is a balance here. The Deputy has opposed every single measure to do with supply of housing that we have in…
The Minister of State, Deputy Canney, is working on this, and is making progress. We recently signed an agreement with Moldova for truck drivers to be able to come and work here automatically. It is needed for the diaspora. There is no question about that. The Minister of State, Deputy Canney, is making progress on it.
I will raise the issue with the Minister for Health. There may be other aspects to this as well. We do not want any anxiety in any location around this. I will talk to the Minister in respect of it.
I thank the Deputy for raising what is a very important issue. General practice is one of the cornerstones of our health service. Forty-three percent of the population now has access to free GP care and Government investment has significantly increased. We spend in excess of €1 billion annually on general practice to support patients. There is a strategic review of general practice under way. The Minister for higher …
I thank the Deputy for raising the issue of Carrabane National School. If the tenders were issued in January 2024, it is difficult to comprehend why it did not get the green light soon after that. I certainly will engage with the Department of education on this and more broadly in terms of capital allocation to education. We have invested a lot in school buildings in the last number of years but it is vital to the qu…
Is that the Office of Public Works, OPW?
I will talk to the Minister of State, Deputy Moran, in respect of this fascinating location and site. It is very historic, so obviously we would like to have it reopened, but I will have to get the timeline for the Deputy.
It has obviously gone on the open market. I will talk to the Minister of State, Deputy O'Sullivan, who has responsibility for the National Parks and Wildlife Service, but these are issues it pursues. We do not normally talk about land sales but obviously it is out there. I will see what its position on it is.
I applaud the Deputy's very precise and accurate recollection of what I said last year in respect of the-----
Absolutely, and I repeat and endorse everything I said. As I said at the time, the review has not been brought to Cabinet but it is complete. I would not hold my breath and have some disappointment with the review in terms of its lack of focus on urban councils. There is a focus on municipal area districts. We will examine it and bring it to the House for debate. I believe we need to look at some urban areas to begin…
We will examine it. Again, obviously, the market has to operate as well. I am just making a general point. We will certainly examine the legislation, constructively and in an engaging way, and we will see if we can-----
Yes, I know. All right. I cannot arbitrate here in one minute.
First, we need to continue to work with Tusla. It is all great calling for independent reviews, inquiries and everything. That just paralyses organisations. That is the other side of that coin. We have to deal with children now who need care today, tomorrow or the day after. A balance needs to be struck in terms of how we deal with this. There are very serious issues here and all is not well in certain aspects, parti…
The easiest thing we can do is call for reviews and have everybody investigating everybody else with everyone too afraid of their shadow to get things done.