Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I warmly welcome this debate. It is at a time of crisis that people must be kind, stand up to the plate, and put out the hand of friendship to people who are in distress or in trouble. I suppose, to be honest, we never thought we would live to see a time such as we are witnessing now. It is good that the Irish people and the Irish Government - everybody - are putting their shoulders to the wheel in what is a significant challenge considering that we are so challenged already trying to take care of our own housing needs, our own education needs and our health needs. It is like those who have little. What do they always do? They try to give something of what they have to somebody else. That is what the Irish people are doing.

If you go back to Live Aid, etc., we were always more generous per capitathan any other part of the world. We were known for that.

I thank the people of County Kerry, including Cahirsiveen, Killarney, Tralee, Tarbert and all the other parts of the county where Ukrainians have come to live and send their children to be educated. I thank the people in healthcare, the Irish Red Cross and all the voluntary organisations and individuals. Let me give examples of the efforts being made by individuals and the random acts of kindness. Young girls came to me to say they are able to teach Irish dancing and want to go to a centre where Ukrainians are staying to teach it to the young girls and boys there. Random acts of kindness like that would restore your faith in humanity when it is challenged on seeing the awfulness of man's inhumanity to man, as brought about by people like Putin. It is so great to see the exact opposite in counties in our country. I wanted to acknowledge that on the record of the Dáil. There will be awful challenges. Of course, there is no denying, in a housing crisis, the compounding effect of what is happening. However, we will just have to work our way through it. We will do so.

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