Michael Mullins (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I can assure Senator Cullinane that there will be no shortage of time to debate the Water Services Bill. I have no doubt that people will not be taken in by the huge U-turn his party took in recent weeks on the water issue.

I join the Deputy Leader in extending our sympathies to the families in Australia who lost loved ones yesterday in the most unfortunate hostage situation which occurred there. It was a very worrying day for many Irish people yesterday who have loved ones in Sydney. I had some worrying moments myself. I have a niece who was evacuated from her place of work yesterday, which is located right behind the restaurant in question. We also all wish to remember in our thoughts today all the families of the 100 children in a Pakistani school who are dead as a result of an attack by the Taliban in recent hours. It is a most horrific situation.

Will the Leader arrange a debate in this House next term with the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources on oil prices and why it is we are not seeing a bigger drop in the price of oil at pumps and in the price of home heating oil, despite the fact that Brent crude oil has dropped below $60 a barrel for the first time since 2009? It hit €59.75 today. Oil prices have taken a 50% plunge since June of this year. We are only seeing relatively minor adjustments at the petrol pumps. We need to have a full debate on the reasons for this. We could also debate all the economic reasons oil prices are dropping so significantly. It is very interesting to see that overnight in Russia, key interest rates increased by 6.5%, bringing interest rates to 17%. There are some people in this House who will remember the bad old days when interest rates were 17% in this country.