Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputies for their questions. Deputy Durkan asked about the depth of discussion on the social issues most affecting people. That is very much what the Cabinet committee on social affairs and public services is all about. Health is dealt with separately, as is education and children, but that committee has a major focus on housing issues, in particular, and monitoring the implementation of Housing for All. This year, we will exceed our target of building 29,000 new homes. It will be well over 30,000 this year, which means bed spaces for 75,000 extra people, if you think about it. A considerable amount of new housing is being built in the country but, of course, a considerable deficit has to be closed as well.

In recent months, there has been a big focus on the cost of living. People will be aware of the measures announced in the budget to help them with the cost of living. They are seeing energy credits reduce their bills during this billing period. We heard some good news today from one of the electricity companies announcing a reduction in electricity and gas costs. We expect to see other companies follow suit, which is very encouraging. People will also have received the double payments, such as double child benefit payment and the Christmas bonus, in recent weeks. Those are the kinds of things we focus on. I am very pleased to see that inflation is now coming down and, I hope, is back under control and will be in 2024.

On Deputy O'Sullivan's question on flooding and the humanitarian assistance scheme, I join him in complimenting the community welfare officers in Cork on their work. It is possible for the Department of Social Protection locally to second staff to help out where needed. The paperwork is kept under review. I appreciate that it can be quite stressful to have to fill in all those forms when somebody has experienced a flooding event or some other form of emergency, but we need some form of checks and controls as well. It is ultimately taxpayers' money in the end and nobody will forgive us if it is found to have been misspent.

Deputy Ó Murchú again raised the issue of ambulance delays in his constituency. I have seen correspondence with him on that. I have asked the HSE to come back with replies to his questions, provided it is able to. It should be able to in most cases.

Deputy Murnane O'Connor talked about staffing in Carlow Citizens Information Centre. I am not sure whether the issue relates particularly to a lack of staff or just an inability to get staff. It could be a bit of both. We need to work on that for sure. More and more, we need to try to use modern technologies to help people. I am not saying a person can be replaced by a YouTube video or AI or anything like that, but they can certainly be helpful in providing people with information and assistance in a way that was not possible in the past.

I understand the point Deputy Boyd Barrett made on the cost-rental thresholds. I will ask the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, to examine the misalignment that may exist between income and affordability criteria. We will certainly examine that. I point out, however, that cost rental, when advertised, is heavily oversubscribed so it is not that any more people would benefit. We need to significantly scale up cost rental so that more people can benefit.

Deputy Paul Murphy raised some issues around the lack of sporting facilities in his constituency. Through my work in my constituency down the years, we have greatly improved sporting facilities across Dublin 15. It requires work. You have to sit down, work with the council, and help clubs to make sports capital grant applications. In my constituency, through a lot of work and working with clubs, we have managed to improve the number of facilities people have. It is that twin-track approach that works best.

I assure Deputy Tóibín that nobody has ever exchanged blows at a Cabinet meeting or subcommittee meeting. Rows in the Government are always greatly exaggerated by the media. Sometimes, I only know I was involved in a row when I read about it in the papers. That is the quality of some journalism in the State, unfortunately. When it comes to health funding, the health budget for 2024 is the biggest ever. There has been a very substantial increase in health funding, which has gone up from €14 billion in 2016 to €22.5 billion in 2024. It has gone up faster than population growth or the rate of ageing. These are real increases. We allocated an additional €92 million today in the REV. While the Ministers, Deputies Donohoe and Stephen Donnelly, have to work out exactly how that will be allocated, some will be for new drugs in 2024 because they are needed, and some will be for the nursing home support scheme to make sure we do not see an increase in waiting times for the fair deal scheme.

On CAMHS, Deputy McDonald spoke about the big increase in demand for mental health services among young people. That is something we have all experienced in our constituency work. We think legislation for the regulation of CAMHS makes sense in principle, but I have not read the Bill from cover to cover. We will have to make sure we do that and examine it too.

I am informed that yesterday VMware notified the Minister, Deputy Coveney, of potential redundancies in Ireland. The company has advised us that it will seek to avoid the proposed redundancies where possible and will explore that in the consultation process with staff, which will begin this week. IDA Ireland will work with the local leadership team to understand the skills profile of the affected employees and match that with existing or target client skills requirements.

See this speech in context