Results 21-40 of 1,505 for speaker:Eileen Flynn

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: Business of Joint Committee (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: My question is not a challenge; it is only for us, as a committee. When we launch the report, will it contain recommendations or will it just be a summary of the groups we have brought in?

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: Business of Joint Committee (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Okay.

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: Business of Joint Committee (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Would you call it an interim report?

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: Business of Joint Committee (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Again, I am not challenging this. I am just making sure we are not all looking like eejits landing a report.

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: Business of Joint Committee (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Brilliant. I have to leave to vote. I thank the Chair.

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: IBEC Report on Infrastructure Ambition for a Competitive, Productive and Resilient Economy: Discussion (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: No, that is grand. I thank the Chairman. I have a few questions so I hope the witnesses will bear with me. They call for rebalancing the system to provide the common good over individual rights. Who decided what the common good is and why should affected communities lose their voice? Second, they call for a "standing forum with private sector deployers". Will this forum also include...

Committee on Infrastructure and National Development Plan Delivery: IBEC Report on Infrastructure Ambition for a Competitive, Productive and Resilient Economy: Discussion (25 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Just to be clear, that does not include trade unions or the community groups.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: I thank the Chair. I look forward to doing the work with my colleagues on the committee over the next few years. It is a cross-party committee. It is great to have members on the committee who care for the Traveller community. I look forward to meaningful work going forward and, most important, actions that may save the lives of some Travellers.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: We will come back.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Mr. O'Sullivan claimed earlier that there has been a full drawdown of funds for the past five years. However, between 2008 and 2018, local authorities only drew down €110.6 million of the €168.8 million allocated. What has changed since then, and what has been put in place to stop this pattern from returning? The 1995 task force identified a need for 1,000 transient bays,...

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Yes, because a lot of that money was not spent on Travellers. It is important that we are very clear on this, because none of us here is living the experiences of the Traveller community.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Taking it back, Mr. O'Sullivan said that 78%-----

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Some 79% of Travellers are living in social housing.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: That is, from the Department's point of view, as Mr. O'Sullivan said, positive. However, is that the accommodation that Travellers want or is that the accommodation that communities force them into? If we do not have the definition of "culturally appropriate" and what that means for many of the Traveller community, I find it a wee bit difficult to grasp. I am currently dealing with a...

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: For many years, Travellers have spoken about how society wants to make us fake settled people. When we go into the fact that 79% of Travellers are housed in local authority housing but without their needs being met or being culturally appropriate-----

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: Travellers make up more than 9% of the homeless.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: For the record, does Mr. O'Sullivan know who the Minister with responsibility for Traveller accommodation is because we are not-----

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: It is not the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins.

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: I thank Mr. O'Sullivan. When it comes to the money being spent on waste management, social workers, maintenance and caretakers on these sites, as Mr. O’Sullivan outlined, I am a little concerned that these workers are not members of the Traveller community. These are workers from the general population. I do not know how this fits with the Traveller accommodation budget. Mr....

Committee on Key Issues affecting the Traveller Community: Funding Strategy for Traveller-Specific Accommodation: Discussion (19 Jun 2025)

Eileen Flynn: That money is coming out of the Traveller accommodation budget that is meant to home Travellers. It is not meant to go to waste management. There are great social workers in all of the local authorities. This is an issue that has been going on for years. That is meant to be done via social workers through Tusla, the Department of Social Protection or whatever other Department deals with...