Results 2,341-2,360 of 40,330 for speaker:Leo Varadkar

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: It can take the pressure off first-time buyers by ending its opposition to the help-to-buy scheme-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: -----and it can stop threatening small landlords with more taxes and regulations. If Sinn Féin does those three things it will help resolve the housing crisis. Will it do those things?

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: Will it do those things?

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I acknowledge, as does everyone on this side of the House and all three parties in government - we are a three-party Government - we are facing a very serious housing crisis, indeed a housing emergency, that is affecting people in all sorts of different ways, whether it is people having to pay very high rents, people who are experiencing homelessness or people struggling to find their first...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: In my previous response, I acknowledged the housing crisis and housing emergency, and the impact that is having on people. I acknowledged that many times. I continue to do so because it is important and right to do so. I have not said we have turned the corner on the housing crisis. I never said that. The Tánaiste said we turned the corner on new home construction-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: -----which is clearly a different thing. He is correct in that regard. When I see posters for the Deputy's party, I see the three things it says it stands for. One of those things is honest politics. It is not honest politics to falsify quotes, misquote me or misrepresent the Tánaiste. That is not honest politics. We are hoping for a different type of politics from the Deputy. It...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: -----and more first-time buyers bought their first home in January this year than any year since 2010. Is it because she does not want those things to be true?

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I can guarantee the Deputy that we will do the right thing; it is just the case that we disagree as to what the right thing is. When it comes to this entire matter, the Deputy has been very disingenuous in how she has spoken about it. She is deliberately stoking up additional anxiety and fears among people who have enough to worry about as it is.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: Deputy McDonald is creating the impression that 4,000 notices to quit in the past three months will result in 4,000 evictions and 4,000 more families needing emergency accommodation. That is not the case. Does the Deputy know how many new tenancies there have been in the past three months? There have been 19,000.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: There have been 50,000 new tenancies in the past year. The truth is that the vast majority of people and families will find alternative accommodation. The relatively small number who will not, and we cannot know for sure how many that will be, will be provided with emergency accommodation-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: -----and whatever supports the State can provide them.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle. It is our view that extending the eviction moratorium until the end of January, the depths of winter, which is Sinn Féin policy, will just make things worse then. It is not a solution. These are the solutions. It is more social housing. We built more social housing last year than in any year since 1975. There has been no government in the Deputy's...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: Once again, it is a decision for which Sinn Féin voted. Moving on, I ask, as I did yesterday, for a different approach from the Opposition. Instead of rhetoric, anger and words, I am asking it to help us to solve the housing crisis. It can do so in three ways. It can stop opposing new housing in their constituencies.

Written Answers — Department of An Taoiseach: Citizens' Assembly (22 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: The Convention on the Constitution and the Citizens’ Assemblies to date have been established by Resolutions of the Houses of the Oireachtas and operated independently of the Government. Arrangements for payments to Chairpersons of the various Assemblies have been determined by resolutions of the Houses of the Oireachtas. The Chairperson of each of these bodies has been entitled to...

Ceisteanna - Questions: Health Strategies (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I thank the Deputies for their questions. On the wider piece about the use of well-being indicators, which I am very much in favour of, in fairness to this Government and all previous Governments, including ones I did not support, they have always taken into account more than economic growth, GDP and public finances. The nature of politics is that you take into account many different...

Ceisteanna - Questions: Health Strategies (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I propose to take Questions Nos. 19 to 25, inclusive, together. The Wellbeing Policy Statement and Framework for Practice is a programme for Government commitment to measure how we are doing overall as a country and to improve our understanding of quality of life in Ireland. It does this by bringing economic, societal and environmental outcomes together under one framework. It places a...

Ceisteanna - Questions: Departmental Meetings (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I thank Deputy Tóibín. I think he was referring to the constituency of Dublin Rathdown rather than the county area of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. As I often say to Deputies from all parts of Ireland, there is a lot more to Dublin than Dublin 2, 4 and 6. I often hear comments from rural Deputies about Ireland beyond the M50. I am somebody from Dublin who has lived beyond the M50...

Ceisteanna - Questions: Departmental Meetings (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: They are great but there is more to Dublin than Dublin 2, 4, 6 and 1. The publication of the IPCC report yesterday confirms that with global warming already having reached 1.1°C above pre-industrial levels, climate change is causing widespread and increasingly irreversible losses and damages. We have a rapidly closing window of opportunity to maintain a liveable future for humanity....

Ceisteanna - Questions: Northern Ireland (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: I will take the questions in reverse. Deputy Gannon asked about the Good Friday Agreement and how we would assess it now. I think it has been a great success despite its failures or limitations. It has given us three things, one of which is peace, and almost everyone in Northern Ireland accepts that political objectives can be pursued only by peaceful means. There is agreement on...

Ceisteanna - Questions: Northern Ireland (21 Mar 2023)

Leo Varadkar: Sorry. I heard Deputy Ó Murchú's question. I am afraid I do not have an answer to it. I am not familiar with those changes, but if he wants to come back to me directly on it, I will look into it.