Ruth Coppinger

5. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Taoiseach to report on his attendance at the recent European Council. [26851/25]

One of the most brutal things I have seen is the picking up by ICE of children and people off the streets of the US yet how far away from it are we given what happened here last week where 35 people, including five children, were deported to Nigeria? The report from the children's school principal and those who knew them said that they had been fully integrated in the school for three years and th…

It is a shame. The Minister was asked what the alternative to deporting children was. Maybe listen to what Simon Harris said when children were deported a few years back and he rallied behind them but the Taoiseach has just decided that this is popular.

It is like what Trump is doing, is it?

10. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Taoiseach when the Cabinet Committee on Disability will next meet. [26852/25]

There was a march on Saturday through the streets of Dublin in horrendous weather. It was organised by parents, especially mothers, in a group called FUSS and Equality in Education Ireland. They are ordinary women who have had to spend their whole lives organising to get rights for their children. Many of them still do not have school places and many parents have contacted me who are in the same p…

The Taoiseach's Government promised 12 families that they would have places in the school last September. All those children are sitting at home or doing another year in preschool because Government failed to deliver. All that is needed are modular buildings but we have to be honest here: this is linked to chronic underinvestment in the public sector and to the housing crisis. We cannot get therap…

29. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Taoiseach to provide an update on the shared island initiative. [29590/25]

There were worrying and horrific scenes in Ballymena last night of hundreds, potentially thousands, of people gathering. It would appear some racist attacks were committed on homes. It follows an alleged serious sexual assault on a teenage girl, and I extend my solidarity to that girl and her family. Two teens have been accused, and as soon as it became potentially the case that they were non-nati…

On a point of order, there is not a quorum here. I need to leave. I have been here for a few hours. I am calling a quorum.

Well, I am leaving now. The Government could not even get a quorum for housing statements.

It is again very unfortunate the Minister is not here for a debate on a slew of new measures affecting the whole rental sector.

He is on the "Six One" news. He is not here, is what I said and the debate has been going on for an hour and a half.

We have not had a chance to question the housing Minister, that I can recall, since coming into this Dáil. I wanted to register that. We have already seen him raising this great idea of the housing tsar. Somebody commented that we have not seen a tsar disappear so quickly since 1917. That idea has gone. I will address some of the measures announced today. No-fault evictions have been banned for l…

83. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform if he will examine providing pay incentives to public sector workers where there are acute recruitment and retention issues; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28899/25]

What incentives will the Minister provide for public sector workers because of the acute shortages we are seeing? Some 382 roles in the national children's hospital are unfilled. There are 700 vacancies for psychiatric nurses. There are 529 unfilled posts throughout the children's disability network teams, CDNTs. Some 500 new social workers are required per year. Some 75% of secondary schools are …

In our mutual constituency, the resounding message at the doors is that young Castleknock is in Australia. That was said to me. I was told I would not meet anyone over the age of 23 in the area. The Mayor of London estimates that a worker needs £9,600 extra to live in inner London. There is a London weighting allowance, for example, for the NHS, whereby a worker in inner London is paid 20%, or up…

In other words, the Government is not going to do anything. That is the reality. It is going to stick by these collective agreements that do not serve all groups of workers. I will give the examples of the Tories, who I would not be singing the praises of at any time. Due to the teaching crisis in the UK, a scheme was introduced to make bursaries available. To teach chemistry, for example, a prosp…

This is a very important issue. It is about treating workers in a humanitarian way. We have a huge number of healthcare assistants, mainly working in private nursing homes, who the State brought here on special work permits because it could not find the labour in this country. These people are mainly women and mainly nurses. They are fully qualified nurses who work, if you like, below the level of…

I am surprised to hear the review is still under way. People have made submissions. Unite trade union is now organising these workers. This is very positive because migrant workers have not traditionally been able to participate in the trade union movement. It is very difficult and scary for somebody working in a private nursing home to put their head above the parapet. These workers staged a demo…

People often speculate about what they would have done in Nazi Germany or in the 1930s. The answer is that whatever you are doing now is what you would have done then. The Minister of State is in government and has power. I thank the Labour Party for moving this motion. I do not agree with every word it contains, however. There is no global community. That has been utterly exposed. Imperialism has…

I move: "That the Bill be taken in Private Members' time."

Babies are dying.

People are dying.

I move: That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to amend the Animal Health and Welfare Act 2013 to ban the hunting of a fox or foxes; and to provide for related matters. I understand we have an unprecedented situation where a Deputy will be opposing this Bill, but I will come back to it later. With fox hunting banned in England, Scotland and Wales, Ireland has become an outlier…