Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Could the Tánaiste enlighten the House as to the status of the Technological Universities Bill? There have been many complaints among the wider public that the Dáil has not passed much legislation. I believe it is a legitimate complaint. New politics is blamed.

However, in this case and many others, the root cause is a complete lack of engagement with other parties, in particular Fianna Fáil, on various Bills. I had engagement with the Minister for Education and Skills about a year ago and have asked for further engagement but there are many people in the higher education sector, such as DIT, which I visited with my party leader last week, who simply do not know what is going on and are left in limbo. The Dáil has shown itself to be willing to legislate if it can but in many instances, it depends on the Government to bring forward that legislation or, at the very least, to engage with us on what it expects to be in the legislation.

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