Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

Today, thousands of teachers and healthcare workers in the North of Ireland are on strike. They are on strike because there have been real-term cuts to their salaries in the last number of years. The education sector is in a massive crisis in the North at the moment, with the former Minister of Education, Ms Michelle McIlveen, admitting that there was a £750 million hole in the education budget. Health, education, housing and transport are all in crisis. One of the reasons they are in crisis is because there is no Executive. We are all waiting tentatively for this particular deal to be made and for the DUP to accept it, but is it not wrong that the whole of the democratic process and the ability to invest in public services is actually being held to ransom by the DUP? Will the Taoiseach support calls for the reform of the Good Friday Agreement system so that no political party, Sinn Féin nor the DUP, can hold the Executive to ransom again?

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