Results 32,501-32,520 of 40,330 for speaker:Leo Varadkar

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: This is really a matter for the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, who administers that scheme through the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI. As is always the case with a grant scheme, there is a budget limit. There is no grant scheme that I am aware of where money is not limited. There has to be a limit on the budget and, therefore,...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: It is a good question and I am afraid I do not know the answer. I will have to check that out for the Deputy. As has been reported, efforts were made last week to resolve this dispute. The Workplace Relations Commission, which is an office of my Department, hosted talks involving the trade union, Mandate, and the liquidator, KPMG. Unfortunately, those talks did not come to a successful...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I am very sorry to hear that the Deputy's constituent is waiting on that operation. A considerable amount of effort has gone in to reducing waiting times for scoliosis operations in the past couple of years. Extra staff have been hired and a new theatre in Crumlin has been provided. Lots of things are happening. I do not have the details of the individual case to which the Deputy...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I am familiar with these devices and they really are extraordinary. They are changing and will change the way we manage diabetes. The idea is that somebody can wear a sensor that can monitor his or her blood sugar without strips, pin pricks and all the things we have been used to for decades. I am glad that it is available for people under the age of 21. I do not know why it is not...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I am afraid that I do not have any information to hand on that matter. I will ask the Minister of State with responsibility for mental health and older people, Deputy Butler, to contact the Deputy.

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: The budget provides for an increase in funding for Irish Water next year. It is to be hoped that will allow some projects to be progressed. I cannot speak about that individual project because I do not know enough about it. I will certainly check it out.

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for raising this matter. That is happening. We have signed the national broadband contract and work is under way. Unfortunately, it is going to take a couple of years but we will connect every home, farm and business in Ireland to high-speed broadband, and in the vast majority of cases we will be bringing fibre to the premises, which is a huge achievement and a big...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for raising this matter. This is a matter on which I do not have a note in front of me but I am aware that it is a matter that the Minister for Health is aware of and I will ask him revert to the Deputy on it.

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for raising this matter and, as he may know, I am head of the ministerial committee on insurance that is trying to deal with some of these issues. The report from the Central Bank that came out this week is very welcome and is helping to give us more transparency about the pricing of insurance. It is a matter of concern that the cost of claims has not gone up as much as...

Written Answers — Department of Trade, Enterprise and Employment: Bereavement Leave (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: An employee's entitlement to take time off in such circumstances depends on whether any provision exists in the employee’s contract of employment providing for such leave. For the vast majority of workers, conditions of employment, including bereavement leave provisions, are matters for negotiation between employers and employees. In the absence of any such provisions in an...

Written Answers — Department of Trade, Enterprise and Employment: SOLAS Training and Education Programmes (5 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I propose to take Questions Nos. 60 and 61 together. Under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Construction Regulations 2013 certain categories of construction workers must hold a SOLAS Safe Pass card. With the imposition of public health restrictions last March, SOLAS, through its parent Department, requested an amendment to these Regulations to extend the four-year validity period of...

Confidence in Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment: Motion (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Taoiseach, the leader of the Green Party, my party colleagues, colleagues in Fianna Fáil and Independent Deputies for their words of support. First of all, I wish to restate my apology to the House. I am sorry for my actions that gave rise to tonight's motion and I accept sole responsibility for them. While my motivations were sound, the manner in which I conducted...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Workplace Safety (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for raising this important question. Content moderators working for social media platforms play an important role in preventing the wider distribution of explicit content on these platforms. Social media content moderators should be treated by an employer in the same way as any other worker exposed to a potential harm. The employer must ensure that the employee has...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Workplace Safety (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I am familiar with the work. It must be very difficult work to do to have to sit for hours on end watching explicit, violent or deeply offensive content. Some of it can be done by artificial intelligence but we know that that is not good enough. That is why one needs a human being to do much of that work. Somebody needs to do it. If they do not do that job the content gets online and...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Workplace Safety (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I certainly would be happy to do that. As I say, it must be extraordinarily difficult work to do but it is work that somebody has to do to protect the rest of us. It is important that those staff who agree to do that job have their well-being protected. I meet representatives of Facebook and other digital platforms maybe once a year. I will certainly make it part of the agenda or if...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Job Losses (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputy for his interest in this issue. He raised it with me previously, as have Deputy Fitzmaurice and Senators Dolan and Murphy. I was disappointed to learn of the decision by Aptar to close its facility in Ballinasloe. My primary concern, as I said previously, is for the workers and families who have been impacted by this decision in losing their jobs at a very difficult...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Job Losses (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: It is important to note that 21,000 people are now employed in IDA Ireland supported firms in the entirety of County Galway. That is a substantial increase on 2010 when there were only just over 11,000 people so employed. The increase in the figure, from just over 11,000 people in 2010 to 21,000 people now, is huge. I appreciate that the vast majority of that employment is probably in...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Job Losses (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: As the Deputy says, Ballinasloe is very well located and has access to a lot of the key infrastructure that is needed. It is a good site. I had intended to do something like that at the time but we ran into other difficulties around Covid, as the Deputy mentioned. I am happy to commit to pulling together the agencies and having a particular focus on Ballinasloe over the next couple of...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Employment Rights (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: Under the current level 5 of the plan for living with Covid, people are asked to stay at home. If people can work from home, they should do so. They should only enter their workplace if they are providing an essential service for which their physical presence is required. While we all look forward to the day when we are free to return to our workplaces, the Government wants remote working...

Ceisteanna (Atógáil) - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Employment Rights (10 Nov 2020)

Leo Varadkar: It is true that anyone can request of his or her employer the option of working at home but it is not a legal right in the sense that I mean it. At the moment, people can request term time or flexible hours, which is kind of what I have in mind in setting out a legal framework whereby people could request remote working of their employer and the employer would have to consider it properly...