Mark Wall (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I want to raise the Not our Fault campaign led by Sam and Odette Doran, which other Members have raised previously in this House. Each Wednesday Sam and Odette are outside Leinster House in respect of apartment defects. I was lucky enough to speak with them last week about their campaign and what they are hoping to achieve. There is an urgent need for a debate on this. Other Members have called for a debate on the issue. In fairness, the Government has brought forward a number of proposals to finance and rectify the problem. However, the details on how this would be forthcoming in reality are not there at the moment, unfortunately. The Minister has said that the finance is there. Sam, Odette and others affected by this want to know how to go about applying, how it will affect them and most importantly, when it will actually happen for them. Maybe the Leader could ask the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage to come in and speak about it. It is a call that other Members of this House have previously made as well.

I want to come back to an issue raised by Senator Burke yesterday, facilities for sports clubs. We mentioned GAA clubs yesterday. It is an issue I have brought up in the House previously. There is an urgent need for local authorities to identify land in every town plan throughout the country in respect of sports facilities. More and more sports clubs are coming to the maximum amount of usage of their current facilities. It is my belief that there should be such a facility in every town with a population above 5,000. It is a policy that the Labour Party has brought forward as well. There is an urgent issue because, as we were told by the uachtarán of the GAA only last week, facilities are now at a maximum and are going to run out very quickly. I ask that we have the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media to come in to discuss this.It is something that needs to be discussed quickly given the importance of sports to everybody in this State.

Finally, I raise an issue again regarding a national register for automated external defibrillators, AEDs. This is something that I have raised previously in this House and upon which I have had a Commencement matter previously. When, through Deputy Duncan Smith, we raised a parliamentary question on this issue recently, we were told that there is no funding for AEDs this year. It is important to say that the National Ambulance Service is putting together a register at the moment. We learned from a recent Government report that there are over 9,000 AEDs in the country. The Leader will be familiar with the importance of these in all of our communities. The wonderful community responders are also involved in this. These AEDs save lives in our communities. We need to have a national register and an app. I have been contacted by a number of organisations and community groups which are running their own apps. That needs co-ordination throughout the country, as well as funding and the support of the National Ambulance Service. These AEDs are proven to save lives. We need the funding for them now and perhaps we could write to the Minister to ask for that funding.