Simon Harris

I had a significant one-on-one meeting with my French counterpart specifically about Mercosur. Our links and engagement with France on this remain intense and ongoing. Our position within the European Commission is very well understood. I do not think other member states would be in any way surprised by Ireland's position. What happens next is important. At the moment, the agreement is undergoing…

I will say more on CETA another time when we can have a proper debate. If we cannot ratify a free trade agreement with Canada in the middle of all the turbulence that is going on in the world, I am concerned. I cannot think of a better, less offensive nation to trade with and have a trade agreement with than Canada. Let us have that debate when the time comes. It is for another day. The Deputy pro…

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue and for consistently keeping it on the agenda in his time in the House. It is important that is done. Earlier this month, as he noted, we marked the 51st anniversary of the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 17 May 1974. Those brutal attacks claimed the lives of 34 people, including an unborn baby, injured hundreds more and shocked the country to its core. Mo…

I agree with everything the Deputy said on this matter. I fully acknowledge that very country has a right, even an obligation, in regard to its national security. However, that cannot become a cover for not providing assistance that could and should be provided. This House and successive Governments have constructively put forward proposals as to how that access to information could be provided. N…

I do not have specific insights into provisional findings from Operation Denton. I know it is hoped the report will appear in the coming months. We all hope this provides families and survivors with much-needed answers. I will continue to make the point, as will the Minister for Justice, regarding the importance of this information being provided and, more broadly, the issue of legacy. The Irish G…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 177 and 243 together. I met with Sean Brown's family just over two weeks ago on what was the 28th anniversary of his murder. I was struck by Bridie Brown and her family and the anguish, pain and hurt they have been put through. The family have shown enormous strength and resilience in pursuing this case. I commended them on their tireless campaign for truth, trans…

I join the Deputies in commending Bellaghy GAA and the GAA more widely. The president of the GAA, Jarlath Burns, attended the meeting with the Brown family when they came to see me. Sean Brown was a good, decent man locking up his GAA club when he was brutally murdered 28 years ago. Not only have no answers been given to his family and no Article 2-compliant investigation established, there have b…

I thank the Labour Party and Deputy Smith for bringing forward this motion today. I thank them for the constructive way in which they are approaching the most horrific, appalling situation in Gaza and the Middle East, and I mean that. I approach this debate, and respectfully suggest we should all approach it, by moving beyond the mantra of "Government good, Opposition bad" or "Opposition good, Gov…

I want to begin by welcoming members of the O'Farrell family to the House. I am conscious that for Shane's parents, Lucia and Jim, and his for his four sisters, Hannah, Gemma, Aimee and Pia, this very far from your first time in this House, or in the environs of Government Buildings. I had the honour of meeting you when I served as Minister for Justice. I was in awe of you all. I was in awe of you…

I will begin today by condemning the senseless antisemitic murder of Yaron and Sarah overnight. These were two young diplomats in Washington DC who were killed in the prime of their lives. They were a young couple, soon to be engaged. I think of them and their families, to whom I send our sympathies. I also think of all those present at the Jewish museum in Washington DC last night, who include on…

The sheer hypocrisy of the Deputy. It was only in March of this year that the First Minister of Northern Ireland, who is the Deputy's party's vice president, said that she was delighted that £671 million would be spent on a state-of-the-art children's hospital at Belfast's Royal Victoria Hospital. Ladies and gentlemen, who was that contract with? Does anyone know? It was BAM: the same developer bu…

Not only that-----

I have more to say, please. The contract was announced and it was welcomed.

Not only was the contract signed with BAM, do you know what happened then? It pulled out. As a result, Sinn Féin has further compounded the delays to the delivery of the project. Not only that but the children's hospital that it is delivering in Northern Ireland and that Sinn Féin's First Minister and vice president welcomed is more expensive per square metre than the children's hospital we are de…

They are not my words; they are the words of the Parliamentary Budget Office in the Oireachtas. That office has looked at the hospital Sinn Féin is presiding over in the North and the hospital we are presiding over here and it found that Sinn Féin's is more expensive than the one we are delivering.

Get over yourselves with the absolute hypocrisy.

I very much appreciate that events have overtaken us. First, I join with the Deputy in acknowledging that it is the tenth anniversary of marriage equality today. I acknowledge the pretty significant role the Deputy's party played in this. I enjoyed being in government with the Labour Party during that period when we put this referendum to the people of Ireland and became the first country in the w…

The Deputy is right; this is genocidal activity. There are no two ways about it. The Israeli Government is rather upfront and blunt in outlining its military and political objectives for Gaza, which are abhorrent and clear breaches of international law. As I have been saying, and as I want to continue to say, the Irish people have, through their taxes, sent a significant amount of aid to the peopl…

I thank Deputy Ward for raising this matter. I had the pleasure of meeting the Raphoe Community Playgroup during a relatively recent visit to Donegal. It keeps in touch with me directly, as I know it does with Oireachtas Members from Donegal. I see the Minister of State, Deputy McConalogue, in the Chamber as well. I know it also keeps in contact with the Taoiseach, the Minister for children and th…

I take the Deputy's point and his position with regard to the broader mica scheme and whether it can be changed. The Deputy knows the programme for Government includes a commitment to review it. The Deputy may correct me if I am wrong, but my sense of it when I meet playgroups and others affected is that they just want a solution. They are understandably less fussed on how that solution comes abou…

Does Deputy Tóibín know why I am in my job? It is because we had an election and I got elected. Some 458,000 people gave their first preference votes to my party. An overwhelming majority of people gave votes to the parties and Independent Deputies who make up this Government. It is called a democracy. Aontú ran and got two seats. Congratulations. The Deputy does not lecture me and does not hire m…

-----of course the buck stops with me. Does the Deputy know what else-----

I am going to tell the Deputy what it means. Calm down. He asked his question and I get an opportunity to answer it. It is how this place works. The Deputy asked a question about the children's hospital. I am responsible, of course. I am responsible for bringing the proposal to the Cabinet and for recommending that we proceed. The easiest thing to do in politics if you do not want to ever get into…

I will just point out first of all that the Deputy is very well paid himself. This country spends roughly €110 billion on its annual budget. We made a decision to invest €2.2 billion over several years in a project that will transform children's health and deliver a world-class children's hospital that will not just serve people for the lifetime of this Dáil, the next Dáil and the one after that. …

Pardon the pun. Not only is this children's hospital not the most expensive in the world, as the Deputy has said in the past, but it is not even the most expensive children's hospital being built on the island of Ireland per square metre according to the budget office of this Parliament.