Results 18,261-18,280 of 27,080 for speaker:Richard Boyd Barrett

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It is a group of amendments.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It is a group of amendments.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: All the amendments in the group centre on the same subject.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Every amendment in the group centres on the same question, namely, whether we should rush things through and short-circuit the process or instead protect the process by which citizens can appeal. That is what the debate is about and it is what all the amendments in the group are about. Our amendment in the group is amendment No. 59, so that is what I am speaking to, but I am also speaking...

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: That is the Deputy's opinion and I disagree.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: No, the Deputy is trying to spin it.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: He was having a pop. That is what he was doing. For the information of Deputy Mattie McGrath, the decline in output in the processing of applications by the Government dwarfs the figure he mentioned. It is a decrease of 2,000.

Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: The Deputy wants to know why there is currently a backlog in the industry. It is not the few hundred appeals he referred to, although I do not deny that is an issue; it is the decrease of 2,000 in the processing of applications, most of which would not have been appealed. They would have gone through but they are not being processed, and that is the problem.

Written Answers — Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment: National Broadband Plan (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: 39. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the progress made and the steps he will take to address the concerns of the residents and school in an area (details supplied) about the serious issues with Eir and its provision of broadband, which was the subject of a complaint that has subsequently been progressed by the residents to the Commission for...

Special Committee on Covid-19 Response: Business of Special Committee (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It is precisely because of the threat of Covid-19 to the health and well-being of the citizens that proper scrutiny and discussion of the strategy being pursued is absolutely necessary in order to take the public with us through this difficult situation. I therefore strenuously object, as I have done over recent weeks, to the fact that we do not get a dedicated session with the CMO and NPHET...

Special Committee on Covid-19 Response: Business of Special Committee (30 Sep 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I raised this yesterday. I do not know who blocked or sought to block the two sessions we requested two weeks ago. I appeal to whomever is blocking them to show a little bit of faith in the wisdom and intelligence of us and the people we represent that having open and transparent questioning is not a threat to the public health effort. It will actually assist the public health effort....

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: 9. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the recommendations she has made for a roadmap for the arts and live entertainment sectors to reopen safely, protecting the public and workers across arts and entertainment in addition to ensuring the survival of the sectors as Ireland moves out of Covid-19 restrictions; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27483/20]

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: The people who work in live entertainment including music, the arts, the performers, the sound people, promoters and the crew have been crucified as a result of the pandemic and the restrictions which, with the current trajectory of infections, are set to remain so for some time. I have asked repeatedly for months, as have the people involved, and the Minister will know they have been...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I genuinely welcome the fact that the Minister responded to that informal approach, which I made on behalf of the Events Industry Alliance, to get more representation on the task force. Even since then, however, the situation has deteriorated. With more severe restrictions being imposed in Dublin, and possibly elsewhere, it is a very grim picture that is facing the events, music and arts...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Let us be clear. With the cuts in the PUP, the retrograde decision to allow the banks end the waiver on mortgage repayments and so on, the financial pressure on the 35,000 people working in this sector will become unbearable. They then have the ongoing costs of repayments, insurance and warehousing; we can go through the list of costs. There will not be a sector unless there is a dramatic...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: 11. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht her plans to expand the more than €5 million pilot performance programme from the recently activated July stimulus to the live entertainment and event sector; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27482/20]

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: We covered some of this ground in a previous question. The €5 million announced in the July stimulus for 35,000 people is a pittance. The Minister says this is just a pilot, but a pilot is not good enough for the dire situation that faces those 35,000 people. The Minister will know that the EPIC working group, The Events Industry Alliance, the National Campaign for the Arts and the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Let us make a comparison. The Minister might not give me the exact figures that she is recommending in the negotiations but in New Zealand, the package for arts, music and live entertainment is €175 million. This dwarfs what is being given to, let us remember, a live music and events sector that has never received a cent from Government, and never asked for it, and an arts sector...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Let us be clear. At the best of times many people who worked in the arts were in borderline poverty situations. Cuts to the pandemic unemployment payment and the employment wage subsidy scheme will, potentially, drive thousands of people into poverty. Without sufficient grants to cover insurance costs, warehouse costs, debt repayments and other ongoing payments, people are going to go...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (1 Oct 2020)

Richard Boyd Barrett: The programme for Government commits to addressing the ongoing and shameful homelessness crisis. The Green Party and Fianna Fáil when in opposition supported our Bill to halt evictions. In the context of Covid-19 the Government was forced, rightly, to bring in an eviction ban because making people homeless is totally incompatible with public health, yet the Government has now allowed...