Holly Cairns

First, I thank Deputy Quaide for his dedication and really hard work on this issue. Our motion today can be boiled down to one simple principle: disabled people have the same rights as everyone else. They have the right to a home, the right to decide where they live, the right to remain part of their community and the right to relationships, privacy, autonomy and dignity. These are not optional se…

Schools are closed, teachers are on leave and families are on holidays. Incredibly, I have to ask the Taoiseach if the Department of education knows that. If it does, why did it choose this week to announce a whole new application process for special class and special school places for the 2027-28 school year? Parents and schools only found out yesterday. To add insult to injury, the portal closes…

I do not know how the Taoiseach can stand up in here and say there is not a change when this is very clearly a huge change for schools, teachers and students, without engagement with them, without understanding of the impact and, seemingly, without even understanding the school calendar. If it were not so serious, it would be comical. The Government has failed to provide school places for hundreds…

Will the Taoiseach answer the questions?

I am not-----

It is not all about the Taoiseach. It is about-----

Answer the question.

Engagement when the schools are closed, is that it?

Two weeks ago, I raised with the Taoiseach the issue of the 19 survivors of Dunderrow National School.

A Cheann Comhairle, week after week, the Taoiseach does not seem to be able to hear me in the Chamber. Do we need to examine the microphones?

Two weeks ago, I raised with the Taoiseach the issue of the 19 survivors of Dunderrow National School in Kinsale, who are being denied redress. I told him that the Government's strategy in these cases is "delay, delay, delay". He said, “It is not delay, delay, delay in respect of the mediation that has been sought". Lo and behold, what do we have? A delay in respect of the mediation that has been …

It is another week of chaos in the criminal courts as hundreds of solicitors have withdrawn their services for legal aid. Thanks to the actions of the Minister for justice, Deputy Jim O'Callaghan, thousands of cases have already been adjourned, not just in the District Court but in the Circuit Court and the Central Criminal Court, where the most serious crimes are prosecuted. Yesterday, at the Cen…

I think everybody agrees that reform is needed. The point is that the Minister for justice's approach has been an absolute disaster. His review looked into 350,000 cases. He is repeatedly citing three cases. Three in 350,000 does not really stand up to scrutiny. In addition to that, his main argument for pointing the finger at solicitors is the number of adjournments, but there is no mechanism for…

I did; I said we would check why the adjournments are happening.

Carmel Cantwell's brother William died in Bessborough mother and baby home. Speaking at a vigil on Sunday she said, "The land itself holds the truth. These buildings, these fields hold stories and secrets and the remains of our family members". That truth now lies buried. If planning permission is granted next week, this Government has a big decision to make: do its State apologies mean anything o…

Can the Taoiseach imagine what it must feel like to not know if your baby, your sibling or your niece or nephew is buried at the site in Bessborough or, potentially, was sold abroad? Like Carmel Cantwell said at the weekend, the truth lies in the grounds. We are talking about some of the worst human rights violations and some of the worst crimes imaginable. We are talking about forced family separ…

Is there a site that is too big to warrant-----

-----the investigation of the disappearance of over 800 babies?

I said the Government should purchase land compulsorily.

No, I do not find it a wonderful thing to say.

Someone dies from a drug overdose in Ireland almost every day. Drug deaths in this country are almost three times the EU average. The Taoiseach has a big decision to make. The Government can keep on doing what we all know is not working - criminalising people who struggle with addiction, failing to fund the services that could help them and cramming people into overcrowded prisons where drug use i…

The Taoiseach said the Government is taking a health-led approach to this issue. Respectfully, the Government is not taking a health-led approach. A citizens' assembly was established and issued its findings. A cross-party Oireachtas committee did the same. Both of them found that we need to change to a health-led approach. That includes decriminalisation among a range of other health-led approach…

I want to read into the record the testimonies of two women who were sexually abused by Leo Hickey, their principal in Dunderrow National School in Kinsale. One said: Sometimes while abusing me with his right hand, I would see him put his left hand inside the clothes on the lower part of the body of the girl beside me. Again, this could last for the duration of the class. Another said: I rememb…

What the Taoiseach has highlighted is the well-established practice of the State. At the hands of the State, people are seriously and systematically abused. They try to seek justice. There is delay after delay, an interdepartmental group, a commission of investigation, and a redress scheme that is blatantly cruel and excludes the people who need it, then the State does it all again with another re…

I move: That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to provide price transparency for consumers by preventing hidden price increases by way of quantity reduction, allowing consumers to make informed purchasing decisions. When people go to the supermarket they deserve to know what they are paying for. They deserve to know if the product they bought last week has become smaller this …