Mary Lou McDonald

Did the Taoiseach come in on his tractor?

For decades, Dublin inner-city flat complexes like Oliver Bond flats have been failed by the State with families been forced to live in damp overcrowded flats and communities left to battle neglect, antisocial behaviour and organised crime alone. Dublin City Council agreed a regeneration plan to deliver safe modern homes for local families but yesterday, the Government pulled the plug. The Ministe…

The Government pulled the plug on the Oliver Bond House project.

The Taoiseach has misled the House.

The Government pulled the funding.

Then do something about it.

I move: That Dáil Éireann: notes that: — Dublin City Council (DCC) has 6,000 flats across 100 complexes built from the 1930s to the 1960s; — due to poor maintenance by the Council, and underfunding by central government, living conditions in these flat complexes are amongst the worst in the city; — these sub-standard conditions have a significant impact on community cohesion and the well-bein…

Rubbish.

Has the Minister of State been in any of these complexes?

Come and visit them.

Apparently the Government does.

How long did that take?

How long did that take?

The Minister of State needs to come and visit the flats because he is speaking from a position of absolute ignorance.

How long did Dominick Street take? A generation.

The Government parties do. They are in the Gallery here. This is deeply frustrating. This is doolally stuff, with no bearing on how decent people are currently living, on the Minister of State's watch.

The Minister of State is joking.

That is them. That is a good one.

Oh, my God.

That is a disgraceful response. Have he visited them?

The Minister of State is welcome to come to my constituency and visit to see how people are living.

Yesterday the Taoiseach told working people and families struggling to get by to wait until next year's budget. He might help them then or he might not - wait and see. That was his message. The consequences of that indifference were exposed yesterday. While the Taoiseach downplayed the pressure on households, the regulator released startling figures. The number of households behind on their electr…

Yesterday.

The number of households in arrears that I quoted to the Taoiseach come from February. That predates the Trump-Netanyahu attacks on Iran. That has made matters worse, which I absolutely acknowledge. What the Taoiseach cannot acknowledge is what the regulator and the CSO are telling the Government directly today, namely, that the cost-of-living crisis is getting worse, including for groceries and e…

That is the truth and families know it. I put it to you directly that your attitude of sitting back and watching this unfold is not acceptable. We need measures now. One of them is energy credits.