Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We are living in historic times. The restoration of the political institutions in the North and Michelle O'Neill fulfilling her role as First Minister is a moment to celebrate. I congratulate her and her team. Challenges have been overcome to get us here and more challenges await us in the future. They are challenges such as public services being at breaking point, housing and cost-of-living crises, and health services being chronically underfunded and overwhelmed. The need to approach these challenges together, in a unified way, has never been stronger. The Irish Government must move forward with the newly restored Executive, in unity, to work together strategically to ensure funding for essential infrastructure, improved funding for health and other essential public services, which will benefit and serve Ireland as a whole. Working together to ensure job creation, regional development and promoting an all-island approach, with North-South co-operation at the foundation of it all, is the way forward.

The time for rhetoric and negativity is gone. Michelle O'Neill as First Minister and Emma Little-Pengelly as deputy First Minister, are working together in conjunction with the Irish Government to move forward positively to actively achieve the best for the country as a whole. These challenges also present opportunities to work together in unity to follow through on the full meaning of the Good Friday Agreement with an all-Ireland approach to drive economic change. In the words of the late Martin McGuinness, "The most important thing to say is that Sinn Féin isn't going back to anything. We are a party on the move." Michelle O'Neill, as First Minister for all, and Sinn Féin will be the driving force behind that move.

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