Feargal Quinn (Independent) | Oireachtas source

We had a good debate last week - perhaps not long enough - on the floods although these do not seem to have improved after it, I do not know whether the debate caused even more flooding. We must ask whether the responsibility for the floods lies with ourselves when one considers the planning permissions given over the past 20 years to enable development to take place on land that was certainly unsuitable. This may not be the cause of some of the recent very severe floods but it must be a consideration. It may be tempting not to find time to have a further debate on this issue but it is worthy of debate as more wet weather and flooding is anticipated at high tide this evening.

Senator Barrett raised the matter of the Single European Payments Area. I have been hearing about this for years and we have been looking forward to its introduction. We hear now that it may not provide anything like the opportunity we thought to speed up payments across international borders.

The House will have a debate on Europe tomorrow. The European Union has expressed an opinion on the right to vote for expatriates. Britain will not permit expatriates to vote in British elections once they have been in exile for 15 years and the EU has ruled against it. We need to debate this issue and tomorrow's debate would be an opportunity to do so. This is a short sitting week which suggests to me that we should use this time to debate a number of issues that would benefit the community as a whole.