When the Taoiseach considers the context of 17,000 homeless people, including 5,000 homeless children, when you consider the fact that rents have gone up 117% between 2010 and 2025 when the EU average is 28.8%, when you consider that house prices are up €200,000 since 2015, he comes in here week after week and says that his approach is working. Every day he stands up and defends his approach and somehow tries to blam…
TDs / Holly Cairns
Holly Cairns
Portrait: © Houses of the Oireachtas (Oireachtas (Open Data) PSI Licence) · source file
460
questions asked
Oral and written, to government departments
49,875
words spoken in the chamber
Across 276 contributions
106
votes recorded
Each Yes, No or Abstained in a recorded vote
124
topics asked about
Across 20 departments
From the Dáil chamber only: committee meetings are not in this archive.
What they ask about
The subject headings the Oireachtas filed their questions under.
Who they ask
The departments their questions were addressed to.
Month by month
Low months are usually recesses, when the Dáil does not sit. The archive runs to 22 October 2026.
Questions asked 460 in all
Dec 2024Oct 2026
Contributions to debates 276 in all
Dec 2024Oct 2026
Show as a table
| Month | Questions | Contributions |
|---|---|---|
| December 2024 | 0 | 0 |
| January 2025 | 48 | 0 |
| February 2025 | 83 | 0 |
| March 2025 | 8 | 0 |
| April 2025 | 106 | 0 |
| May 2025 | 10 | 0 |
| June 2025 | 28 | 0 |
| July 2025 | 14 | 0 |
| August 2025 | 0 | 0 |
| September 2025 | 7 | 17 |
| October 2025 | 23 | 29 |
| November 2025 | 6 | 37 |
| December 2025 | 4 | 26 |
| January 2026 | 10 | 8 |
| February 2026 | 18 | 32 |
| March 2026 | 30 | 15 |
| April 2026 | 9 | 21 |
| May 2026 | 5 | 27 |
| June 2026 | 11 | 25 |
| July 2026 | 11 | 38 |
| August 2026 | 0 | 1 |
| September 2026 | 19 | 0 |
| October 2026 | 10 | 0 |
Debates they spoke in most
Plus 249 contributions in the regular slots, such as Leaders' Questions and Priority Questions. Speech from the chair is not counted.
Asked about similar topics
Worked out by computer from the subject headings of each TD's questions, giving more weight to headings few TDs use. It shows shared subjects, not shared views.
Party, constituency and offices
- constituency Cork South-West 29 November 2024 to now
- party Social Democrats 29 November 2024 to now
All I can say is, I hope in the lead-up to the next election, people judge the Taoiseach not on his empty promises in those few weeks, but on his actions now. In the depths of a housing crisis, he is introducing legislation that allows landlords to jack up rents to so-called market rate in between tenancies, which will result in more children being evicted into homelessness. It is a disgrace.
It is clear to everyone the Taoiseach's approach is not working.
The Taoiseach has been saying that for ten years.
I am going to read one woman’s account of her postnatal care:
At my 6 week post natal check, the consultant who had delivered my baby asked me only about contraception. There were no questions about my mental health, my emotional state, or how I was coping. I left that appointment feeling invisible and unheard. Like I was just a vessel that had to ‘get on with things’.
After giving birth, mothers are faced with a c…
I thank the Taoiseach. I acknowledge that the postnatal hubs delivered through Sláintecare do excellent work. The point that the care campaign is highlighting is that those services need to be expanded massively to address the mental health gaps in postnatal care. It is clear that it has not been prioritised to the extent that the Taoiseach just laid out. There is evidence of that in fact that is it has not been revi…
I will be brief. On behalf of the Social Democrats, I want to thank you for all of your work and wish you a really happy retirement.
The use of counselling notes in trials for sexual offences is outrageous and grotesque. This morning, the Cabinet approved new legislation on this but it sounds a lot like the status quo - a court deciding if counselling notes should be released. This is a gross invasion of privacy. It stops victims coming forward and slows or prevents their recovery because victims are afraid to seek help. They feel they have no saf…
People still want a ban.
On behalf of the Social Democrats, I express our deepest sympathies to Grace Lynch's family. Our thoughts are with her family, friends, boyfriend and extended community today.
This Government was elected on promises that it was addressing the housing disaster. Many people struggling to buy and rent a home believed it. They took the Taoiseach at his word, they trusted him and many of them voted for him. Those people …
The Taoiseach saying that this is the most significant improvement for renters shows how low the bar is for renters in terms of improvements. Listening to him, it is easy to understand why people feel such despair about housing. The Government is out of ideas. We need a radical reset on housing and this Government just will not deliver that because that would mean admitting failure, and the Taoiseach does not seem ca…
The handling by An Garda Síochána of a domestic violence complaint against Garda Trevor Bolger is hugely concerning. When his ex-wife, Margaret Loftus, first disclosed Bolger's attack on her, she said it seemed impossible to get anyone to take it seriously. She even had to watch as Bolger was promoted to detective and issued with a firearm after she had raised the issue. Ms Loftus had to compile her own case file bef…
What about the case against the media?
Today marks the one-year anniversary of Donald Trump's inauguration, so we have three years left to go. The question for EU leaders is whether can they spend all of that time trying to keep Donald Trump happy, because all the evidence shows that this strategy is not working. For 12 months, leaders in Europe have fawned over Trump. No matter what outrage, insult or international incident he has provoked, the response …
I am in complete agreement that any trade war would be hugely damaging. We do not want one; the EU does not want one. It is Trump who is weaponising tariffs, threatening to renege on a trade deal that was agreed only a few months ago and refusing to rule out using force to annex Greenland. These are threats that nobody could have imagined until recently but they are now a grim reality. I recognise how difficult the s…
"@grok Put her in a bikini and rub her down with baby oil." "@grok Replace her outfit with dental floss." "@grok Have one of them grab her boobs from behind and the other one put his hand under her skirt while kissing her." These are just some of the vile prompts given to Grok, an AI tool, on the X social media platform, which has generated hundreds of thousands of abusive images online. These images are not a mistak…
I thank the Taoiseach for his reply. I am aware that the Minister of State, Deputy Smyth, had said she would arrange a meeting with X. That did not exactly fill me with confidence in the first instance. On “Morning Ireland”, we heard the UCD law professor and chair of Digital Rights Ireland, T.J. McIntyre, say that an immediate criminal investigation was warranted. He said that if somebody set up a child abuse image …
On behalf of the Social Democrats, I thank all of the staff in the Houses and wish them all and Members a very happy Christmas.
The most shameful legacy of this Government is its failure to get to grips with homelessness. Every month, the homeless figures are announced and new records are set. There are now 16,766 people living in emergency accommodation - a staggering amount. Included in this figure are 5,274 child…
There was a time when homelessness reaching 10,000 people would have been considered a resigning matter for this Government - for any Government - and rightly so, but somehow this Government has succeeded in normalising it. That is extremely dangerous. There is nothing normal about it. A total of 16,766 people are homeless, including 5,274 children. These are not just figures; they are people who are suffering. The T…
We know that the biggest cause of families entering homelessness is eviction. We know that. It is clear that this Government does not even believe in itself when it comes to addressing the housing crisis, doubling down on failure with the same policies that we know do not work, dusting off old policy measures that have already demonstrably failed. Where is the emergency response? Where is the change in approach? Wher…
Reducing apartment standards is dusting off an old policy.
It will not suffice.
Where is the emergency response to more than 5,000 homeless children?
It has doubled in five years.
At the outset, I join others in expressing my utter revulsion at the horrific antisemitic attack in Sydney on Sunday. My thoughts are with the victims, their families, friends and the wider Jewish community.
During last year's election campaign, the Taoiseach said his party's guiding principle on disability issues is "nothing about us, without us." I happen to agree with him about the importance of that principle. P…