Catherine Ardagh (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I want to raise the issue of receiving a cancer diagnosis during maternity leave or during a pregnancy. We had a super presentation on this by the Irish Cancer Society and there is an anomaly in the legislation that those who receive or have to undergo cancer treatment during their maternity leave cannot defer their leave and go on sick pay at that time. Rather, they have to use their maternity leave for their treatment. This affects approximately 60 women in Ireland annually. This is something we should address and, therefore, I ask the Acting Leader to bring this back to the Minister. A small amendment should be made to the legislation in order that this cohort of women can defer their maternity leave while they are undergoing treatment.

I thank the Minister of State at the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, Deputy Chambers, for all the sports capital grants that were allocated last week. I also want to extend a special word of thanks to the Minister for Education, Deputy Foley, who yesterday opened a special school for children with autism in Crumlin, Our Lady of Hope School. It was a long-fought campaign by the Dublin 12 campaign 4 Autism Inclusion and it was great to see the school finally open yesterday with the huge support of the Minister and I thank her for that.

On the sports capital programme, many clubs in the inner city in my area and in Senator Fitzpatrick's area do not own their playing fields and pitches and cannot avail of the funding. They are competing in the same leagues as other clubs and they are seeing other clubs announce on Facebook and Twitter that they are getting €150,000 in funding, yet they barely get €500 to rent pitches. That is unfair and something should be done for clubs in the inner city or in areas where they do not own their land. We know sports capital is just that by its nature but something has to be done to help these clubs to access pitches and resources for the youth. It is unfair because the kids then go to other clubs that have resources.