Sharon Keogan (Independent)

I want to be associated with the expressions of sympathy for Pope Francis. I welcome the one minute of silent prayer at the end of this session.

Outside this Chamber there is a rising issue that is dominating Irish society. Inside this Chamber we hear nothing about it. Out there, in the bars, in the taxis and on the streets, it is all people are talking about. Yet, in here, on the benches of the Seanad and the Dáil, we hear absolutely nothing. The issue is, of course, immigration. I speak of the gigantic national rally that took place last Saturday, when up to 20,000 people marched through Dublin to oppose the Government's suicidal open-borders policy. Despite the numbers, we have still heard nothing about it. I have previously warned that if we in these Houses do not address immigration, others will. However, our ruling parties still seem intent on ignoring it, hoping it goes away. RTÉ has followed this approach on perhaps the only area in which it seems to have a good relationship with its Government funders at the moment. When RTÉ did pay attention it focused on the counterprotest which was organised by the taxpayer-funded NGOs that tell Irish taxpayers that any problems they may have with mass, uncontrolled migration are imagined. The Opposition parties have not proved much better. In fact, many of them threw in their lot with the vastly outnumbered counterprotestors. They waved banners saying "We have a housing crisis, not an immigration crisis". It is simply delusional to think the immigration crisis can be separated from the housing crisis, the law-and-order crisis, the healthcare crisis and so many other crises. Politicians and elites are prone to delusions but, luckily, the Irish people are not. You can keep ignoring them but their numbers will only keep growing.