Results 141-160 of 45,779 for speaker:Micheál Martin

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: The role will be very similar, the same as for the Minister of State, Deputy Burke, now and the Minister of State, Jack Chambers. For years, I think people wanted a senior Minister in the Department of Defence. I am the senior Minister in the Department of Defence as well as the Department of Foreign Affairs because for years people felt that having just a Minister of State dealing with...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: I share the concern of the farming community at the incessant rain we have experienced now since last July. Bar maybe a few weeks in August, it has been raining. Our food production system is being undermined as a result of that weather - there is no doubt about that - which, on another day, we should also reflect on in terms of broader debates about the changing weather patterns. As...

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: There is a context to all this. I will always recall, when I was leaving Kyiv, that there is an exhibition in the train station which recalls the horror facing the population of Ukraine at the time. There were desperate photographs of mothers with their children looking out the windows at their husbands, in-laws, grandparents - frightened children. That was the scene.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: Roscommon County Council made a judgment. It was a matter for it, on legal advice, to make a judgment on whether to pursue the pipe, essentially. It took a decision to withdraw. There might need to be some reflection on that. I know Roscommon County Council is now working with the OPW to identity a viable engineering solution to the flood risk. I am told the timeline is this quarter in...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: I understand that can be done but the issue will be whether that will be a temporary emergency which is reversible or something else. The people need something more sustainable and long term to resolve this issue. The water levels are extremely high because of the weather over the past six months, which means the issue has been exacerbated. The OPW has been engaging with the National Parks...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: It was based on the commentary of the court and so on that the council took its decision. We can get advice from officials here, there and everywhere, but when people are in the heat of the kitchen or courtroom and sense it might not be going in their direction, they take actions. We have to be cognisant of what we can legally do. I would argue anywhere that the protection of people's...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: Whatever we can do to prevent flooding and protect that village, we will do. I do not know whether the Deputy has produced legislation or whether the legal advice he is getting-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: It is an important point. Sometimes Deputies present us with Bills and say "Here is the answer". It has to be about the people the Deputy represents. We cannot just say there is a panacea of emergency legislation. That can be judicially reviewed and we could end up with one. There is an engineering solution on the table, I understand. I would have thought we should get that engineering...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: That will be faster. We still have to provide the engineering solution, no matter what laws we pass in here. We will engage with Deputy Fitzmaurice and the other Deputies on this issue and with the Senators who have raised this with us. I am up for whatever is the most effective, efficient and timely way of dealing with this for the people whose livelihoods are involved.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: I will.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: I was involved in that. That was around procurement.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: On one level, I admire the excellence of the Deputy as a polemicist and propagandist. This is about the restoration of excise duties and was well flagged. They were reduced during the crisis. The Government staggered the restoration but Sinn Féin in its alternative budget proposed the excise reduction be restored in one go on 1 April 2024, unlike the Government's two-step restoration.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: Your budget said the excise reduction should be restored in one go.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: Then you mentioned October. I presume you are referring to the carbon tax.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: It is sleight of hand by you. In your budget you factor the carbon tax revenue into your calculations.

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: You are playing Tadhg an dá thaobh all the time, are you not? Are you for the carbon tax or against it?

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: Why do you put it into your budget then?

Ceisteanna ar Pholasaí nó ar Reachtaíocht - Questions on Policy or Legislation (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: You are a Tadhg an dá thaobh. You are flip-flopping. You are U-turning.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: I will deal with the triple lock. First, in 2023 and 2024 to date, no applications have been received or exemptions granted to permit the carriage of munitions of war on civil aircraft flying to a point in Israel. Second, no airport in Ireland or Irish sovereign airspace is being used to transport weapons to the conflict in the Middle East or any other war. People should stop trying to...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (11 Apr 2024)

Micheál Martin: It is an absurdity for the Deputy to suggest that any amendment to the triple lock is about ditching neutrality or aligning with any other member state. It is not.