Pat Casey (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I also welcome the Minister today and wish him well in his new role in public expenditure and reform. The purpose of today's Bill has already been outlined. It is to increase the number of Ministers of State up to 23. Anybody who lives in a modern, complex society must understand that the challenges increase daily and there is a need to split roles and responsibilities.This is what the Taoiseach has outlined. It is a very strong programme for Government that needs to be implemented. To implement that successfully, we need key people over strategic areas in it. Even within that, we could look at it and say we need to break it down even further. If we look at the role for my colleague in relation to trade promotion, AI and digital transformation, AI could warrant and deserve a Minister in its own right if we take it from a security and safety point of view and the opportunities it will give this country moving forward.

Everybody in the room here might have met people from Age Friendly Ireland. They had a campaign to have a Minister for older people. Nobody denies a Minister for older people is not needed in a modern society. All the Taoiseach is proposing is we extend the Ministers of State by an additional three to spread the responsibilities so we in government can take responsibility for delivery in those sectors.

I fully support this proposal today and I look forward to seeing the delivery of the results of the appointment of the additional Ministers of State. As the programme for Government outlined, the areas of disabilities, mental health, older people and digital transformation are the specific areas we need to focus on and nobody disagrees. We need Ministers of State to track all of that as well.