Results 1-20 of 244 for long speaker:Paul Gavan

Seanad: Employment (Collective Redundancies and Miscellaneous Provisions) and Companies (Amendment) Bill 2023: Committee and Remaining Stages (2 May 2024)

Paul Gavan: .... We heard from employee and employer organisations, which expressed concerns about this issue. Representatives of both Irish and European trade unions as well as Irish and European businesses' stakeholders along with the European Commission have identified that the Irish legislation transposing the transnational works council directive, the Transnational Information and Consultation of...

Seanad: Employment (Collective Redundancies and Miscellaneous Provisions) and Companies (Amendment) Bill 2023: Committee and Remaining Stages (2 May 2024)

Paul Gavan: I endorse everything my colleague Senator Sherlock said. Given that we have waited so long for the Bill, this is a missed opportunity. It has been years in the making. There is a lack of ambition or perhaps an ideological objection. Ultimately, this comes down to whether the Government believes trade unions are good and should be valued and whether collective agreements should be valued....

Seanad: Nithe i dtosach suíonna - Commencement Matters: Recycling Policy (21 Mar 2024)

Paul Gavan: The Minister of State is very welcome, it is good to see him. As he knows, the return scheme was launched with much fanfare at the beginning of February. It is a scheme that was long overdue and was very much welcome. According to the return websites, the aims of the new recycling scheme are to achieve EU recycling targets protect our environment, reduce litter and waste and play a key...

Seanad: Health (Termination of Pregnancy Services) (Safe Access Zones) Bill 2023: Committee Stage (27 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ...but the idea that you target people on their way to private medical appointments is entirely wrong and flies in the face of the vote we had for repeal just a few years ago. We have been waiting a long time for this legislation. We are nearly there. Let us get on with it.

Seanad: Nithe i dtosach suíonna - Commencement Matters: EU Directives (22 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ...It is the modern day equivalent of the old hiring fairs. I put it to the Minister of State that the Government is not committed to tackling false self-employment because if it was, it would have long ago tackled the issues of exploitation we can see on our high streets on any given evening in any major city in our country. In December, the EU published a proposed directive on platform...

Seanad: Situation in Palestine: Motion (21 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ...taken. I want to hear the Minister of State say he will do so.It was in Fianna Fáil's manifesto and the Green Party's manifesto to endorse the occupied territories Bill. Surely Fine Gael is no longer opposed to that point of view? Let us see action. The people of Ireland expect action. My last point is this. I cannot help but see the contrast with the treatment meted out to...

Seanad: An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (8 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ...O’Neill was elected First Minister with the DUP’s Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly. With many others, I witnessed first-hand epoch-making events. It was a day like no other in Ireland’s long and conflicted history; a day of great hope for the people of Ireland and of great opportunity for a new beginning. It was a great day for the Good Friday Agreement...

Seanad: Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2023: Committee Stage (8 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: I do not want to prolong this unnecessarily. I accept the Minister of State's point in terms of three years and three months. However, he and I both know that if a report comes back three years and three months into a term, the likelihood of the recommended changes being made into actual legislative changes by the time the five years is up is slim, to say the least. That is my concern....

Seanad: Local Government (Mayor of Limerick) and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2023: Committee Stage (8 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ..., ceremonial role. It is over five years since the people of Limerick voted in the plebiscite. After such a wait, it was extremely disappointing to see the Bill as initiated. I am not sure why it took so long to come up with a Bill that provides the mayor with little to no power. Providing the mayor with the power to acquire land will go some way towards addressing the absence of real...

Seanad: Finance (State Guarantees, International Financial Institution Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2023: Second Stage (Resumed) (1 Feb 2024)

Paul Gavan: ..., require humanitarian assistance. Attacks and extreme weather have left 1,000 villages and towns across the country without electricity or water. The economic impact on Ukraine will have long-lasting consequences. Huge parts of the country’s infrastructure have been destroyed. Public debt has soared and the fiscal deficit has spiralled. The total amount of direct damage to the...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Engagement of Children in Criminal Activity) Bill 2023: Second Stage (31 Jan 2024)

Paul Gavan: ...the best people in those communities lose their jobs and the level of community intervention has never recovered from those cutbacks of over ten years ago. I remember campaigning against those cutbacks alongside thousands of other workers. We were never listened to. We have paid the price since then because all of us know – I could not disagree with anything Senators Wilson or...

Seanad: Health (Termination of Pregnancy Services) (Safe Access Zones) Bill 2023: Second Stage (14 Dec 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...in place that it was a horrendous time. As a result, each year thousands of women were forced to go elsewhere for essential healthcare, to access abortion. It is good to see we have come a long way and it is important to acknowledge that on a day like today. The history of this Bill goes back five years to when, after the successful repeal referendum, my colleague, Deputy O'Reilly, was...

Seanad: Nithe i dtosach suíonna - Commencement Matters: Third Level Staff (12 Dec 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...that almost one third were employed on fixed-term or hourly-paid casual contracts.The precarious nature of employment across the sector is preventing many academic staff from being able to make long-term life decisions such as securing a mortgage or starting a family. They are also struggling to pay bills and rent. The issue is affecting the morale and well-being of the staff in a very...

Seanad: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2023: Second Stage (28 Nov 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...with the cost of living crisis. The tax package needed to be fair, making sure that those on the highest incomes did not benefit disproportionately compared with those who need it most. For a long time, Sinn Féin has argued that the fairest way to reduce tax is through cuts to the universal social charge. We proposed a tax package focused on cutting the bottom rates of USC and...

Seanad: Human Tissue (Transplantation, Post-Mortem, Anatomical Examination and Public Display) Bill 2022: Second Stage (22 Nov 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...on pathology practice and post mortems, emphasising the necessity of consent from either the family or the individual before death. Part 4 establishes a legislative structure for anatomical examination, a long-overdue update from the 1832 Act. Part 5 covers the public display of bodies and related requirements. Notably, a section deals with providing tissues or cells to pharmaceutical...

Seanad: Nithe i dtosach suíonna - Commencement Matters: Community Development Projects (21 Nov 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...risk. This affects 12 individuals in full- and part-time work whose positions are dependent on this scheme. If funding is not sourced by February, it is likely that the centre will have to close down. It will no longer be able to support interventions in one of the most deprived areas of the State.Numerous parliamentary questions have been raised with the Minister by Deputy Quinlivan...

Seanad: Nithe i dtosach suíonna - Commencement Matters: Community Development Projects (21 Nov 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...funding and to put new funding in place. My request of the Minister of State is for more information as to when he put in this request to the council for the strategic plans to be submitted and how long he has been waiting for a response. He might also say something about funding beyond 2024. I would hate to think we were in a situation where, every 12 months, we are going to go through...

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition to Reopen Ennis, Nenagh and St. John's Emergency Departments: Discussion (16 Nov 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...this committee where it gives a voice to people who have been campaigning tirelessly to highlight the horrendous circumstances in which we find ourselves in Limerick, Clare and Tipperary. I have a long history with this issue. I represented workers in Nenagh in 2009 and I remember standing and sharing a platform on a truck in the square in Nenagh with people who were about to come into...

Seanad: Final Report of the Independent Scoping Exercise into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of Mr. Shane O'Farrell: Statements (17 Oct 2023)

Paul Gavan: .... This is not a party political issue; this is an issue of justice. All of the events around the killing of Shane demand a public inquiry and we all know that. As I have said a couple of times, few of us are here for very long and afterwards we need to reflect on what we did during our time here in terms of fundamental questions of justice. Everybody knows something horrifically wrong...

Seanad: Visit of Slovak Delegation (4 Oct 2023)

Paul Gavan: ...mealy-mouth platitudes from Lord Caine on behalf of killers in the pay of the British Government. Our thoughts are with the relatives of those who were murdered by the crown forces and the decades-long devastation caused to families by the British Government's refusal to tell the truth. The message Lord Caine should leave the Oireachtas with, as he closes the door behind him tomorrow, is...