Richard Boyd Barrett

Donald Trump is on a wrecking mission, that is obvious, although I would caution against allowing his Administration to bully us. The reason they have to make America great again is the American economy has declined massively. It used to have 40% GDP, which then went down to 20% by 2014 and it is now down to 15%. The American empire is in decline and Donald Trump personifies that decline. He is tr…

There is not.

It is a contradiction of what the Minister says.

I have been making that argument for years.

Yes.

Is it Deputy Nash again or myself?

We have one supplementary question each left.

I have always argued that multinational capital is not quite as mobile as the Minister thinks. They make big investments and do not just run off and leave them overnight. The Government parties have argued that they have to get down on their knees and offer them zero-rate taxes. The rate is 12.5% in theory but in reality it is less than 1% for Apple, as we know. In reality, it is an effective rate…

Trump is dangerous but the Government can go on talking to him.

Gaelscoil Phádraig in Loughlinstown in my area has had a lot to put up with. School authorities have been waiting 20 years in temporary accommodation to get into their new and permanent location, which is bad enough. From talking to them this week, my colleagues in my office were saying their big problem now is just getting teachers. While they have sanction for additional full-time posts, they ca…

The simple reason we have a housing disaster in this country is that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have danced to the tune of greedy, profit-driven speculators, vulture funds and corporate landlords. The response to the resulting crisis, which has left us with 100,000 families waiting for more than a decade on housing lists, unaffordable rents and unaffordable house prices, is for the Taoiseach to say…

It will be a three-state solution-----

The Taoiseach can just say "Yes" or "No".

Palestinians are the victims; they are not the aggressors.

I bet you I have been on more protests outside the Russian embassy than you have.

The programme for Government refers to work-life balance, quality of life, quality employment and it even contains the phrase "a secure future for all living things", which is quite a noble ambition. I want to shout out for a group of workers very close at hand who do not have any of those things. They are the majority of people who work for Oireachtas TV, who broadcast proceedings from this Dáil …

Does the Taoiseach agree with me?

We do not have a place on the commission but the Government has a place.

I just thought I would start the ball rolling.

It was only raised with me last week.

Will the Taoiseach support them?

About a week ago, I raised the plight of tenants in Sallynoggin who have been living in council houses for years with infants and children where there is mould all over the walls, all of the time, water running down the insides of the walls and rodent infestations. The tenants are still being forced to live there. It has been earmarked for redevelopment but the point is that the tenants want out o…

Sallynoggin. Since I raised this, the people are still in there and still looking to get out. By the way, the Rialto Action Group took a legal case against Dublin City Council some years ago because these kinds of conditions are a breach of the European Social Charter. The group won the case. The Sallynoggin case is similar. These people's rights are being breached by the local authority. Since I …

It is not very stable for tenants.

Impose minimum standards.