Results 821-840 of 8,196 for speaker:Alice-Mary Higgins

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 1: In page 9, to delete lines 15 to 19 and substitute the following: “(3) In this Act, references to environmental development and sustainability shall be construed as references to developments and actions which comply with actions under the Paris Agreement, the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Sustainable Development...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: The amendment seeks to clarify the definition of "environmental development and sustainability". To be clear, the climate crisis is here already and is having a disproportionate impact on the world's most vulnerable people. At the climate action committee, we recently discussed Ireland's climate change assessment report, which was starkly clear that the climate emergency is already having...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: It is true that things are moving rapidly in areas such as climate and biodiversity but the fact that they may be moving rapidly goes against the idea that we would roll back to a position before things were moving rapidly and before the problem was even understood at all; that we would roll back to the 1980s. That is what is happening here. There is a tension being created needlessly in...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I will press it.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I second the amendment.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I support the sentiment in amendment No. 2 from Senator Clonan and I also have a number of amendments in this grouping. Amendment No. 10 seeks to insert a new object in the Bill to require that the agency support and promote parity of esteem between disciplines. Parity of esteem does matter and it has consistently been one of the concerns that have been raised. I will go through the...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 6: In page 11, between lines 10 and 11, to insert the following: “(d) to support measures to bring an end to precarious work in the research sector and promote quality and sustainable employment for all researchers;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: This amendment seeks to insert a new object into the Bill which would require the agency "to support measures to bring an end to precarious work in the research sector and promote quality and sustainable employment for all researchers". The issue of workers' rights in higher education and the research section more broadly is one I have been raising for a long time. In 2018, I launched TASC's...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: There is almost a contradiction there. The Minister of State has spoken about the pillar impact and recognising how important the people working on the careers are in that, but then he says that the agency does not have a remit. However, the Minister of State is setting up the agency. He cannot simply say the agency does not have a remit because he is establishing it. He can give the...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 7: In page 11, between lines 10 and 11, to insert the following: “(d) to promote the development of public research for the public good which addresses social and environmental needs;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: Amendment No. 7 seeks "to promote the development of public research for the public good which addresses social and environmental needs". There is an error in the location in which it is proposed to insert amendment No. 8. I will speak to the general point of that amendment but might not move it. Amendment No. 9 is an alternative to amendment No. 7, which also inserts a new object into the...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I thank the Minister of State for engaging at least and giving consideration to those amendments. With regard to amendments No. 7 and 9, some of the language is there. I had expressed concern around the way environmental development is referred to and about how I believe it is environmental development from a very narrow perspective within the Bill. Nonetheless, perhaps it would have been...

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 9: In page 11, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following: “(f) to support and promote frontier and basic research for the public good;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 10: In page 11, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following: “(f) to support and promote parity of esteem between disciplines;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 11: In page 11, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following: “(f) to support and promote balance between fields and disciplines in the receipt of funding and support;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I second the amendment.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 13: In page 11, line 37, after “capacity” to insert “and careers”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 14: In page 12, between lines 7 and 8, to insert the following: “(h) in co-operation with An tÚdarás, promote, support and develop tangible plans to end precarious work in the higher education sector;”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: I move amendment No. 15: In page 14, lines 34 and 35, to delete “(whether contained in guidelines, codes or other documents, or any combination of them)” and substitute “(which are outlined in guidelines, codes, legislation or statutory instrument)”.

Seanad: Research and Innovation Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages (21 May 2024)

Alice-Mary Higgins: Amendment No. 15 is really about section 11, which I previously opposed as an entire section. Again, it is an attempt to reflect the debate and discussion we had around the very concern that, effectively, there is a requirement that still feels so extraordinary. As I said, section 11, which I opposed, is one area in which the Minister has extraordinary powers in terms of giving directions...