Mary Ann O'Brien (Independent) | Oireachtas source

We all realise what busy lives Ministers and politicians lead - 12, 14 and 18 hour days are the norm. Let us come out of our bubble in this beautiful room and talk about the people who have neither the time nor the freedom to go to the gates of Leinster House. Carers face the lonely hard reality of providing care 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They use daily words such as nebulising, postural drainage, spoon and tube feeding. I should know as I was a carer and had to deal with a screaming, starving child who might have been having an epileptic fit as the tube had come out in the middle of the night and I had to get it back down the child's nose. It is a lonely hard place to be in.

Even if an old person with Alzheimer's disease is able to eat with a knife and fork, one is under strain and stress and suffers from sleep deprivation. One is constantly worried that the person may go missing, whether he or she could be upstairs. downstairs or some place else. We are talking about people who care for others.

Where are all the Senators?