Lisa Chambers (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I support this motion on behalf of my party and commend the Citizens' Assembly on its fantastic work. It has been a good exercise in citizen democracy and seen the engagement of a diverse range of citizens from across the country. They should be commended on taking time out of their lives and work. They travel from all over the country to meet and discuss important issues. I understand that they still have some time left to deal with the issue of fixed-term parliaments.

With Storm Emma, we in this House had no problem closing up shop on the Wednesday and not sitting on the Thursday. We facilitated ourselves and the House's staff by rescheduling the work of that half day and Thursday for the week we returned. As such, why would we not facilitate the Citizens' Assembly doing the same? If we are happy to reschedule our own work due to an adverse and extreme weather event, why would we not extend the same courtesy to the members of the Citizens' Assembly and its staff, who have been asked to do a job of work and, through no fault of their own, were not in a position to complete that work due to this unforeseen event, which put people's lives at risk? Thankfully, we came through it as a nation. The request to extend the time for a brief period so as to allow the assembly to finish the work that it started - the work that it has been requested to do - is only reasonable and fair.

The assembly's work to date has shown it to be a worthwhile endeavour. It has produced some opinions for discussion across the board. It has certainly raised eyebrows, engaged in debate in its meeting room and generated debate further afield. In that vein, I wholeheartedly support the time extension motion. We in this House had no problem rescheduling our own work to deal with Storm Emma. How then could we not extend the time for the Citizens' Assembly to do the same?

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