Ken O'Flynn

Cork alone has 1,788 derelict properties. Nationally, nearly 19,000 homes sit idle while people sleep on sofas or in their cars, working adults are in their parents' box rooms and there will be over 17,000 people in homeless services tonight. The Government has a derelict levy which is obviously not working. The Government has watched some of the local authorities fail to collect a single cent. Th…

In this case, the Government is blaming its Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael councillors.

The matter that has caused great distress in communities and volunteer organisations across this country is a sudden collapse of tickets.ie. Last week, organisers who logged in to draw down moneys owed to them, moneys that had already been paid by ordinary people buying tickets in good faith, were met instead with a webpage telling them that the company, Tickets.ie, and Oshi Software Limited had c…

The reality is that the Minister will have to come up with something in respect of these groups. Many of the festivals will not survive. Some have gone ahead or will go ahead but they are carrying huge deficits. They will go into liquidation. Some are limited companies, some are parish councils and some are community organisations. We will have a serious deficit if the Government does not invest i…

Last week, the Minister for children, Norma Foley, said that she was not familiar with the sexually explicit book What's the T? when asked whether it was appropriate for a recommendation by the State-funded body and promoted by Raidió Teilifís Éireann to children as young as 15. Since then, the former Minister, Charlie Flanagan, has publicly stated that he raised concerns with the Minister, Deputy…

It is important.

It is about transparency.

Will he question the Minister?

I welcome the Minister of State with responsibility for sport to the House. Sport has always occupied a unique place in humane society. It transcends politics, religion, ethnicity and nationality. It brings people together in a way that very few things can. That is why I approached this motion with extreme caution. Let me be clear to this House: I condemn the horrific attacks that were carried ou…

While I welcome this debate, I am representing the constituency of Cork North-Central. In 2034, Cork city will be celebrating its 850th birthday. It is a maritime city, with strong harbour connections and great stories. It has a huge natural harbour as the Minister knows. Our tourism industry is doing well when it comes to the number of cruises, which is up this year. Seamus Heaney from Visit Cork…

The twins above in the Gallery can be very proud of their mother. She is a great parliamentarian. There is a growing sense in this community and across Ireland that the ordinary working people are being pushed to their limits, not just by one single crisis, but by continuous pressure every single day and every single week. Nowhere is that pressure more visible than it is in commuter towns - in co…

Under the previous Minister for Health, third-party insourcing was introduced and used by the HSE to reduce waiting lists and carry out additional procedures in public hospitals outside normal hours. Now, providers are being told the system will come to an end in June, despite no alternative plans being published. At the same time, the numbers on waiting lists have surged to 155,000 since December…

We have seen from the Daft report that there have been brutal increases in the cost of rent. The average in Cork is €2,000 per month for a two-bedroom home. Behind those statistics are human lives. This week in my constituency office, I met a 79-year-old lady from the Mallow area who worked for decades, raised a family and contributed to the community and the State. She never asked the State for a…

There is a moment in politics where the language we use in this Chamber becomes so sanitised and so carefully engineered that we risk losing sight of what we are actually talking about and debating. This is one of those moments because today we are not debating an administrative change or paperwork. We are debating whether the State should remove one of the last remaining safeguards before deliber…

Yet, there was an argument before this House that does not remark on the tragedy of the loss of 10,000 human lives. The argument is that there is too much time to hesitate and we must remove that time. If the position of the Social Democrats is a moral certainty, then the question for it is why is it afraid of three days? That is three days for reflection, three days for people to speak to their f…

I wonder why.

This week in Spain, they have called for the creation of a European army. They argue that Europe must develop a permanent common military capacity. Many Irish people are increasingly concerned that the long-standing Irish policy of military neutrality is being eroded step by step through deeper EU defence integration without a direct democratic mandate from the Irish people. Will the Taoiseach giv…

The defence minister.

On behalf of Independent Ireland and our TDs, I start by saying thanks to every nurse working across Ireland in the hospitals, nursing homes, community care, mental health services and emergency care. I thank every one of them for the tremendous work and their vocation in this State. Without them, we would be in a terrible situation. The irony is not lost on me as we are thanking nurses on this d…

I thank my colleagues in Sinn Féin for introducing this Bill. It is a very good Bill and works quite well. I was kind of shocked when I was reading it because I wondered should this not have been done a long time ago by previous Governments. I welcome it in that sense. The cliché every Member in this House is using is the phrase "heating or eating", but that is the truth. That is what is happenin…

Well, I would like the Minister of State to listen to me and pay attention, if that is okay.

I am only asking for a small bit of respect-----

-----and for the Minister of State to have a small bit of respect for the Leas-Cheann Comhairle as well.

I thank the Minister of State. He will reply-----

-----and he will have his opportunity to do so. Fine. The reality is that there are people in this country who have never been worse off. The Government goes out and says every day of the week that it is doing fantastic and asks people to give it a clap on the back because it has this deficit and that deficit. You cannot eat a deficit. There are people now choosing between turning on their heati…