Results 41-60 of 530 for long speaker:Alice-Mary Higgins

Seanad: Electoral Reform (Amendment) and Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2023: Second Stage (10 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...need to be addressed.I welcome the Minister of State's engagement around the potential but people, especially students and other people who are living in other parts of the country, are travelling long distances from their polling stations. In respect of political purposes, we would, of course, be very happy to engage with others around how we nuance that point. To clarify, however, we...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules (Resumed): Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (10 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...but the consequences have been quite severe societally, politically and environmentally in terms of the fiscal rules. For example, almost a decade was lost in many areas such as climate and long-term investments because of the focus on the short-term rules. Housing was mentioned; perhaps the witnesses can confirm the following. A strong rationale given consistently regarding decisions...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules (Resumed): Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (10 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...It is going to be preventative in that it will be reflected in the ten- to 15-year consequence. There has been an impact. We saw it because lots of countries have parked capital expenditure for a long period. The reason I am pulling out these impacts is so we can ensure we do not make the same mistakes. Another area where we saw them was on housing, specifically in Ireland. The fiscal...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules (Resumed): Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (10 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: .... Can I ask where we are planning to move, for example, towards a well-being budget? We know that we have shadow carbon budgeting, which is a new requirement. We are also looking to the long-standing commitment with respect to gender and equality budgeting but can the council clarify how it sees its role in respect of the national budgetary framework reflecting all of these other...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2023: Committee Stage (4 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...well as the carrot. While I welcome the new grant schemes in respect of vacant homes the fact is that we have not applied pressure in the other way with regard to vacant homes. We have had very long delays. This is an issue that I and others have been raising since 2017. What significant difference could have been made to the housing crisis we have now if we had had real action in...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules: TASC (3 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: .... It is not that they have had not been applied, but that the austerity rules that were brought through and the hard application of short-term fiscal rules have had an actively damaging impact on long-term capital expenditure, social cohesion and social services, as well as on our climate readiness.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules: TASC (3 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...for everybody: the fiscal rules were one of the main reasons used to justify leasing of houses rather than building of public or social housing. It was because the capital expenditure would have a longer term return. Capital expenditure and long-term investment were constrained to the detriment of the social fabric, as opposed to short-term and more expensive approaches, such as leasing,...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Examination of EU Fiscal Rules: TASC (3 May 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...the equivalent of a €6 billion reduction in spending in a year in a country like Ireland. The countries that have already experienced austerity because of the requirements placed on them had a long period of privatisation. There is the issue of how much can be spent but there is also the question of how we spend and constraints on that. One of the concerns is the fact,...

Seanad: An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (26 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...is a call on all companies involved in this trade to immediately halt because Western Sahara is an occupied territory and has been internationally recognised as such. This territory is still awaiting a long-awaited referendum in respect of self-determination. Morocco does not have a mandate and we know that, much as in the case of Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, under...

Seanad: An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (26 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: Thank you. It is a very small point in regard to the housing piece. I am delighted with anything that pushes vacant properties into use, but I am very concerned that we have been waiting a long time with the carrots when we have sticks that have not been used adequately. The 0.3% vacant house levy is deeply inadequate. Back in 2017, in the Seanad, we proposed a much higher levy.

Seanad: Regulation of Lobbying (Amendment) Bill 2022: Committee Stage (26 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...that girls experience inequality, which is a fairly obvious fact. The BAI pulled it because it was concerned about it being a political message. That problem with political purposes, which has been long signalled to the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, and others, really needs to be addressed. We have been promised for years that it would be addressed. If that was in place, it would...

Seanad: Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme Bill 2022: Second Stage (19 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...forcibly separated from their mothers in the same institution and given to others to nurse in order to ensure that a bond would not be formed. There is this idea about someone was not there for that long and moved into another home. It is a suggestion which does not come from scientific analysis that is in any way accurate about the first six months a child experiences. I fear the...

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Report Stage (Resumed) (18 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...candidate and so forth. There is a question, given the separation of powers and that we want a Judiciary that does not simply match a Government that may come or go, but will be in that role for a long period of time through multiple governments, that perhaps it is appropriate that the appointment decision is still sitting with Government but the considerations should sit in a wider frame...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Pre-Legislative Scrutiny of the General Scheme of the Energy (Windfall Gains in the Energy Sector) Bill 2023 (18 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: .... It also has no royalties, low operational expenditure and minimum outgoing capital expenditure. To an extent, we had been subsidising fossil fuel companies by means of tax relief measures for a long period leading into the current boom. Does that not create a dynamic whereby not only do we need to ensure we do not carry those measures forward, but we also need to examine the way we...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Pre-Legislative Scrutiny of the General Scheme of the Energy (Windfall Gains in the Energy Sector) Bill 2023 (18 Apr 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: So it is just one year before we are magically going to exit. It just seems a little long of a-----

Seanad: An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (29 Mar 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...the first day of that Oireachtas, we brought forward a Bill on Seanad reform. We were asked to put it aside and to sit on a cross-party group to put forward collective cross-party legislation. Along with Senator McDowell and others, I introduced the legislation that came out of that cross-party group in 2020 in order to ensure that every citizen would have a vote in electing the Members...

Seanad: Historic and Archaeological Heritage Bill 2023: Report Stage (Resumed) (28 Mar 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...to heritage. I am concerned about how widely and loosely framed this "recurrent activity" is. With regard to amendment No. 15, it is the old case of "stop digging". If you have been digging a long time and in the wrong direction, the simple fact you have been digging should not justify continuing to dig. Amendment No. 16 follows the point made on amendment No. 15. It seeks to insert a...

Seanad: Historic and Archaeological Heritage Bill 2023: Report Stage (Resumed) (28 Mar 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...said section shall not apply to a class of relevant works which would restrict public access to a national monument for a period of more than two years. This is important because our heritage belongs to all of us collectively, as we discussed previously. The relationship with heritage is something we should all be able to enjoy. This is recognising that there may be classes of relevant...

Seanad: Historic and Archaeological Heritage Bill 2023: Report Stage (Resumed) (28 Mar 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ..., the improvement of the monument or supporting the monument. It can be a completely different category of relevant works which is simply there because it used to happen previously. It could be a long-term project of building a completely different public development that happens nearby, so it may not be Tara but it might be the wall next to Tara. There are things like that and it may...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Climate Action Plan 2023: Discussion (Resumed) (23 Mar 2023)

Alice-Mary Higgins: ...part of the TEN-T and part of the new infrastructure. He mentioned the rail lines we already have but there are rail lines that are still there in ghost form in that they have been sought for so long and much of the track is still there. The western rail corridor is part of that. In terms of what the Minister is describing, is there a move towards shifting the way cost-benefit analysis...