Ivana Bacik

Exactly

Hear, hear.

A “For Sale” sign has gone up this week on the Christian Brothers monastery building on Synge Street in Portabello in my constituency. The property has a guide price of €3.75 million. For some time, I have been calling on the Minister for education to ensure that this building will be retained for educational use by the existing four schools on the street. Indeed, I have also called on the Christi…

Whether they will use the proceeds to compensate victims of abuse, we do not know.

I am asking the Taoiseach to intervene with the Minister for education in order to ensure this building remains in public usage as an educational campus-----

-----or at the very least that the money to the Christian Brothers is used to pay victims.

Hear, hear. Exactly.

We are increasingly seeing the consequences of this Government's failure to support working people. Today, National Ambulance Service workers are on picket lines across the country. Our ambulance drivers and paramedics, who do such heroic front-line work, have been driven to strike over pay and conditions. Like so many, they are struggling to make ends meet on their current pay rates. As a result,…

I made-----

I always acknowledge the global shocks and global context in which the Government has to make responses. I acknowledged that it was a different context to the 1980s, but the similarity is that we are losing many of our young people, who have come through medical school here and see a better life and future for themselves in Australia, for example. Here at home, it is the Government's response that…

To PAYE workers?

I acknowledged that.

Vótáil.

I said "Vótáil".

This week is national bike week. As conveners of the all-party Oireachtas cycling group, Deputy Ciarán Ahern and I were delighted to host a cross-party cycle around Leinster House today, and thanks to all the colleagues who took part. We need to see the Government step up and provide proper investment for cycling infrastructure. I ask that colleagues commit not to buy into an anti-cycling narrativ…

I am delighted to second this motion. I commend my colleague Deputy Ged Nash on proposing a mini-budget on behalf of the Labour Party in order to stand up, as he says, unapologetically for hard-pressed PAYE workers and their families, who have been left behind by the Government's policies. Ged has been a voice of reason as our finance spokesperson. He has consistently called out the crazy VAT cuts…

Rising costs are blowing a €2,000 hole in average household budgets this year. That is in today's Irish Independent. The cost of food, health insurance and energy are all soaring. Ireland has the highest household electricity prices in the EU, as Eurostat has confirmed. The Government's words of sympathy for struggling families are meaningless because it is failing to take action to cut energy cos…

Things are serious. They are serious for the many thousands of families and households in arrears on their energy bills. They are far too serious to be toying around with distractions about nuclear power when we know the solution lies in the scalable projects of renewables. The Taoiseach speaks about a Government focus on renewables, but it is clearly evident, particularly since the Green Party le…

It is evident.

Today, parents from Ireland, including our Labour Councillor Ali Field, are travelling to Brussels to present a petition to the European Parliament and institutions asking them to investigate Ireland's failure to meet its legal obligations to children with additional needs. Under the Disability Act 2005, every child in Ireland is entitled to an assessment of need within six months. However, more t…

I welcome our Polish community and also a group of students who are with me from Trinity and schools in Dublin and Wexford. Far too many people in Ireland suffer the trauma of losing their home. That is a direct result of the Government's policy. It prioritises the market over people. It did it in March, incentivising landlords to evict with new rent laws, and it is doing it again now, this week …

Tax breaks for-----

Yes, there is.

I am not dismissing it. I acknowledge it.

We can agree on one thing, which is that supply of homes is key, but the Government is not delivering increased supply. Unfortunately, the only momentum is with the tsunami of eviction notices that people are experiencing. The Government cannot blame the housing crisis on Trump - the Taoiseach knows I have acknowledged the impact of the global energy shock - because the Government's policies have …