Ivor Callely (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Taoiseach's initiative for talks with the social partners. Hopefully, we will see good social and industrial progress as a result of those endeavours. I join Senator Bradford's call for support for the good work of the Carers Association and for its day today. Enda Egan and his team do tremendous work. We are all aware of the importance of home care and I wholeheartedly support him in that regard.

Will the Leader contact telecom service providers to find out what supports and priorities are in place when there is a breakdown in the systems? It has been brought to my attention that a business that depends on its telecommunication system was advised when it reported a breakdown yesterday that it will take approximately four days to deal with that. We all understand these are challenging times for businesses, but there is a need for an emergency response repair unit for each of our telecom providers to ensure a satisfactory response is provided to the business community.

I remind the Leader of the need for restructuring of the fee and collection process for TV licences. The application of the existing system is unfair and the method of collection of fees is expensive and obsolete. I ask the Leader to raise the issue with the Minister to see what progress can be made to ensure we have a fairer, more effective and less expensive system.