Results 21-40 of 6,614 for speaker:Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: While I would not necessarily advocate that the Government would do something provocative for the sake of it, ultimately the flotilla is a consequence of what is happening internationally. There has to be a firm response from the Irish Government and from the international community. As a follow-up to the previous question, we rightly recognised the State of Palestine. I welcome that...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: The Tánaiste will be aware that the next ships that are part of the flotilla are only three or four days away. They contain other Irish citizens, including a colleague of ours, Deputy Barry Heneghan. We are all concerned that the same thing will happen. It is reasonable to ask: what action the Department is taking to prepare for this and what actions will be taken to ensure the...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: We touched on the proposal yesterday. We all want to see peace. Arab countries may have been part of the process but the Palestinians themselves were not. The Tánaiste made a point in relation to the genocide. This is a fundamental point. In lots of respects, the flotilla is a symptom. Ultimately, the disease needs to be cured. As long as there is a genocide that continues in...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: Gabhaim buíochas leis an Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I will divide my time between some comments and questions. I thank the Office of the Ceann Comhairle for facilitating this debate. It is vitally important that we address this issue today on behalf of our colleagues, the Irish citizens and the citizens of the world. For the past number of years, people have monitored and looked at the...

Committee on Defence and National Security: National Maritime Security Strategy: Department of Defence (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: I acknowledge the important work the Department is doing and wish you the best of luck with it. The aim of a session like this is for us to ask questions. Dr. Stanley has said the strategy will be published after the consultation and all the work is finished, so I am not totally clear on what questions she can or cannot answer. I certainly agree this needs to be an area of significant...

Committee on Defence and National Security: National Maritime Security Strategy: Department of Defence (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: One of the key elements I imagine is likely to come out of this in the context of our naval capacity and the Commission on the Defence Forces is the development of a 12-ship fleet by 2040. A couple of things occurred to me, and I want to get Dr. Stanley's views on skills shortages that might constrain our ability to come to terms with the threats we face. Generally speaking, across the...

Committee on Defence and National Security: National Maritime Security Strategy: Department of Defence (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: I ask Dr. Stanley to take that on board in developing the strategy. The need for more personnel might be happening at the same time as demands on other very important sectors such as renewables and so on. They could be competing for the same skills to expand capacity. There is more and more discussion of the danger of hybrid threats, such as physical interference combined with cyber...

Committee on Defence and National Security: National Maritime Security Strategy: Department of Defence (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: It might be useful to put on the record and flesh out what direction this will travel. Sometimes the distinction between our exclusive economic zone and Irish waters is lost. As I understand it, Ireland has a responsibility to monitor what is happening in our exclusive economic zone. This is not strictly speaking our sovereign waters but under international maritime law it is the...

Committee on Defence and National Security: National Maritime Security Strategy: Department of Defence (2 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: A fair bit of this discussion has been on the shadow fleet, primarily with regard to Russian craft. A few months ago RTÉ reported that 245 shadow fleet vessels passed through the economic zone. Obviously, this is one of the key considerations. One of the issues highlighted by RTÉ at that stage was that, strictly speaking, the flags under which these craft operate are of various...

Investment in Sport and Sporting Infrastructure: Statements (1 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: Deputy Ward is never happier than when he is following St. Pat's but I hope he is not too happy on Friday night. Best of luck to City. The growth in the League of Ireland is a welcome development in recent years. More and more people are interested in and are going to games. In terms of the League of Ireland and our national team, we need to examine the issue of academies. It is not...

Situation in Gaza: Statements (1 Oct 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: As we sit in this Chamber, the Global Sumud Flotilla approaches ever closer to Gaza. We do not know what the coming hours will bring. We wait with much trepidation and concern for our fellow Irish citizens, citizens of the world and our fellow Oireachtas Members, including my colleague Senator Chris Andrews, with whom I am in contact every couple of hours. Yesterday, along with some...

Insurance Costs: Motion [Private Members] (30 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: We are at a time of year when families are just coming up for air after paying the back-to-school costs and before long they will be looking at the big costs of Christmas and everything to do with it. Right now, there is very little air for them to get. They go into supermarkets and the grocery bill is higher than ever. If they are renting, their rent is skyrocketing. If they have...

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: If the witnesses do not mind, I am going to ask some general questions to improve my understanding, and that of anyone listening in, of the Reserve Defence Force. My first question is fairly straightforward. Why do the witnesses believe the Reserve Defence Force matters?

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: To clarify, I know it is a very important function. I wish to give the witnesses the opportunity to explain what the Reserve Defence Force is doing and what it is capable of doing if it reaches its full potential.

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: No, it was an excellent answer. I acknowledge the point about patriotism, and we see in other jurisdictions people talk about surge capacity but, whatever one chooses to call it, the ability to scale up is crucially important. I wish to come to the pay piece in a different way. I apologise; perhaps I should know this. The issue of the nature of decisions people make occurs to me. There...

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: I imagine it would be coming up if it was.

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: I have to leave the meeting temporarily, but I will be back for the second round.

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: I have one or two brief questions. It leads on from Senator Kyne's question. I apologise if this was touched upon. When there is, with any organisation, a smaller-than-desired number of people who will very likely be spread unevenly around the country, if you look at a map of the State, are there very particular and obvious gaps with regard to RDF capacity? The Commission on the Defence...

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: Okay. I have one final question. The witnesses talked a bit about the kinds of duties that are there with regard to working with the Defence Forces such as patient transit and all that kind of stuff. On the trajectory, there is an ambitious enough target. I think it is 3,800 in 2028. In order to achieve that, is there enough in expanding the incidence of the types of duties that are...

Committee on Defence and National Security: Update on Issues in the Reserve Defence Force: Discussion (25 Sep 2025)

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire: You are not going to run up against a ceiling with any of the types of duties that exist currently.