Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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Before I ask the Leader to outline the Order of Business, I wish to welcome the students from St. Fintan's National School, Sutton. They are most welcome to Seanad Éireann and I hope they enjoy their stay. I have no doubt they will behave themselves. I think there is a Standing Order - I will have to check with the Clerk - that any school that comes to Seanad Éireann has no homework for the rest of the week. It is up to the students to implement the policy Seanad Éireann has put forward. If they have any problems with that they can write us a letter and we will deal with it next week. I ask the Leader to outline the Order of Business.

Lisa Chambers (Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the boys and girls to the Chamber. The Order of Business is No. 1, motion regarding Planning and Development Act 2000 (Exempted Development) (No. X) Regulations 2023, referral to committee, to be taken on conclusion of the Order of Business without debate; No. 2, motion regarding Planning and Development Act 2000 (Exempted Development) (No. Y) Regulations 2023, referral to committee, to be taken on conclusion of No. 1 without debate; No. 3, motion regarding Planning and Development (Street Furniture Fees) Regulations 2023, referral to committee, to be taken on conclusion of No. 2 without debate; No. 4, Courts Bill 2023 [Dáil] – Second Stage, to be taken at 12.45 p.m. and to conclude at 2.45 p.m., if not previously concluded, with the time allocated to the opening remarks of the Minister not to exceed ten minutes, group spokespersons not to exceed eight minutes, those of all other Senators not to exceed five minutes and the Minister to be given no less than ten minutes to reply to the debate; No. 5, Regulation of Lobbying (Amendment) Bill 2022 [Dáil] – Committee Stage (resumed), to be taken at 2.45 p.m. and to adjourn at 5.30 p.m. if not previously concluded; and No. 6, Private Members' business, Electoral Reform (Amendment) and Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2023 – Second Stage, to be taken at 5.30 p.m., with the time allocated to this debate not to exceed two hours.

Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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I call Senator Malcolm Byrne.

Malcolm Byrne (Fianna Fail)
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I too would like to welcome the students to the Chamber. I hope they enjoy their day in Leinster House and experiencing our democracy. I wish to speak about two primary schools I visited in County Wexford recently, which show how the diversity of our school population has changed. I visited Kilrane National School near Rosslare Europort. I was brought around by the excellent principal Tom Cousins. The school has taken in more than 50 Ukrainian students over the last year because of its proximity to Rosslare. They have been very welcoming as a school. The Department of Education has put in place many resources but the school has been under pressure. I welcome the fact that there is an extension but I think it is also important to acknowledge the role of schools like Kilrane and what they have done. On Monday, I was at Bunscoil Loreto in Gorey, which has taken in a significant number of Ukrainian students. For Europe Day, under the leadership of the school principal, Aileen Kennedy, and a number of the amazing staff there, they performed "Ode to Joy" in six languages and musically. It reflects the diversity of our school system and we must acknowledge how the system - teachers, boards of management and students - have responded to welcoming those who have come here from Ukraine. We now know there are 14,931 Ukrainian students in our education system, which is a significant number. More than 5,000 of those are at second level. They are making a very active contribution to the school communities but Ukrainian is not, as yet, a school subject. I would like for us to look for Ukrainian to be introduced as a school subject at junior and leaving certificate levels. We offer a range of school subjects in other European languages and in non-European languages, including Japanese. As an understanding of the culture and language of Ukraine, for Ukrainian students, it is important they keep it up. For as long as Putin's war continues, we will be a welcoming home for many people from Ukraine. To do that, we must ensure they can maintain their culture while they are here. A significant number of them are going to stay here. It is important we work with the Department of Education and the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, NCCA, and in the same way we have expanded our language options to include Polish, Lithuanian, Estonian and Russian, all of which are welcome, introduce Ukrainian as a subject.

Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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I call Senator McDowell.

Michael McDowell (Independent)
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I welcome the students from St. Fintan's school as well. I hope they have an enjoyable day. There are several matters I want to deal with regarding the Order of Business. I wish to remind the Leader, before I start, that I have in recent times obtained generalised agreement to the proposition that the Garda Reserve would be the subject of a ministerial discussion and debate in this House and that the issue of prison overcrowding would also be discussed as matter of urgency. I reiterate those requests that those matters should be addressed by the Department of Justice in this House. They are important issues. The Leader, who herself has a record of service as a reservist, will understand the nature of my concern that volunteering and reserve activity in Ireland is being allowed to atrophy at the moment.

The second issue I wish to raise which I think the House should consider, is housing prices because the issue is affecting the use of hotels and the diminution of tourism employment across the economy, consequent on the deployment of hotels for accommodating badly-needed places for asylum seekers. We must have clarity from the Government as to what the revised plans for our tourist industry are and an update on the Government's plans to accommodate asylum seekers, especially Ukrainian asylum seekers, to whom Senator Byrne referred a few moments ago. These issues must be considered on a national basis. We need a calm, reflective debate on these issues, namely, the Garda Reserve, prison overcrowding and the effect on the tourism industry of the diminution of hotel spaces, particularly in places like County Kerry, where much seasonal employment is jeopardised by the absence of accommodation for tourists.

Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)
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I wish to ask the Leader for a debate about health services. Two reports which came out recently, one from the Saolta University Health Care Group in the west region, where there is overcrowding at Mayo University Hospital, Castlebar, which is affecting the accident and emergency department. It is crowding out services and the hospital is under huge pressure, asking people not to attend hospital if at all possible and to go their GPs. There was another report about cancer services in the west, at University Hospital Galway, which is the cancer services provider for the west and north west. The hospital has complained it does not get the same level of funding as other hospitals providing cancer services in the country. We need a debate in the House about accident and emergency and cancer services in the west and north west.These issues are putting massive pressure on the west region and in particular on our area. It is difficult enough to go a long distance from rural Ireland, particularly along the west coast, to get to Galway University Hospital for any service. To be going there on a continual basis for cancer services and to be denied some of those, or to be late getting the services that are being provided in other areas is not on in this day and age. All they are looking for is the same level of services as are provided in the other hospitals in the south and on the east coast. It is important that we would have the Minister for Health come to the House and tell us what is happening and what can be done in respect of these services.

We had Professor Keane here a number of years ago and he recommended a number of hospitals around the country that would provide cancer services. Galway University Hospital has responsibility for providing the services in the west and north west. It is a massive geographical area. It is a fair ordeal for those who have to get to the hospital and it is not on that they may be told they are going to be late or the service cannot be provided. I would appreciate if we could have the Minister here at some stage to bring us up to date on the accident and emergency department at Castlebar, where there is a lot of pressure, and on the cancer services being provided for our region at University Hospital Galway.

Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein)
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I want to raise two issues today, the first of which is that of family resource centres. Along with my colleague, Deputy Quinlivan, I stepped across to Buswells yesterday to meet a number of people from the family resource centres national forum, including the local one in Limerick, the Northside Family Resource Centre. We had a very good engagement on the crucial work they do. I think we are all familiar with that work. They give tremendous support to families, communities and educational schemes. It is also important to recognise what they have done for refugees, particularly for those from Ukraine but also from other areas, in reaching out and giving them the essential supports they need.

They had a very clear and simple message yesterday, that they really need to have their core funding increased. Indeed, 83 family resource centres are not actually receiving the agreed funding they should be getting. They have costed it and the cost throughout the State would be €3.3 million. I want to put in an urgent plea for a debate on this topic ahead of the budget, so that we can all get together and get behind the family resource centres. The Northside Family Resource Centre delivered more than 32,500 meals last year to 300 older people and 20 children. The impact they make on people's lives is incredible. Their early years learning is incredible, too, but again they talked about the challenge they are facing in recruiting staff. We know the issues around that. I call for the issues in respect of wages for early years educators to be urgently addressed. Right now there are 242 children on a waiting list in Limerick who cannot get resources. Part of the reason is that they cannot get the staff to carry out that essential care and early education. I hope we can have a debate in the near future to recognise the important work of family resource centres.

In the minute or so I have left, I also want to make Senators aware of the scandalous treatment of workers by Tesco Ireland at the moment. I hope colleagues are aware of this already. A number of workers, those who pick and deliver the goods for people's home shopping, are to have their wages cut by thousands of euro from next Monday. Changes to these workers' terms and conditions are being imposed without agreement with the trade union, Mandate. The difference it will make will literally be thousands of euro. We must bear in mind that Tesco has obscene levels of profits and does not need to do this. It is choosing to do so to increase profits even more at the expense of the very workers who earn those profits for the company. For me it is an issue of morality as much as workers' rights. I call for an urgent debate on this issue of workers' rights. We see the big corporates squeezing workers and squeezing terms and conditions. This is a prime example. Tesco is going to make its workers thousands of euro worse off each year. It is also going to cost them additional moneys in terms of child care because of the change to their terms and conditions. None of this is necessary. It is being driven by one thing only and that is corporate greed. I call for an urgent debate.

Frances Black (Independent)
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When it comes to the Israeli apartheid regime's crimes against the Palestinians, the international community is stuck in a cycle of condemnation and inaction. The UN has condemned Israel for violations of international law thousands of times but nothing has been done, partially because of the US veto on the UN Security Council. This pattern has fostered a sense of impunity within Israel. Israeli leaders believe they can do whatever they want without facing tangible consequences and that is extremely dangerous. Just in the last week we have seen an EU-funded school demolished in the West Bank and children killed by Israeli bombing in Gaza.

I introduced the Control of Economic Activity (Occupied Territories) Bill in 2018 to disrupt the cycle of condemnation and inaction. I would like the Irish Government to back up its rhetoric. We won the argument. We won the support of ordinary Irish people and we won the votes on the floor of the Dáil and Seanad. Unfortunately, the Bill was blocked but I will not give up on this issue. A development that makes me very optimistic is the formation of the Irish Anti-apartheid Campaign for Palestine in which I am involved. It is a civil society coalition of more than 20 organisation including trade unions, development charities like Christian Aid and Trócaire, NGOs like the Irish Council for Civil Liberties and Amnesty, and campaigning groups like the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Sadaka Ireland and Jews for Palestine. We are coming together to ask that the Government recognise that Israel is committing the crime of apartheid against the Palestinians and to take tangible action on foot of that recognition, including passing the occupied territories Bill.

On the 75th anniversary of the Nakba, the campaign is launching a pledge. That is what I want to talk about today. People from all over Ireland can sign up to signal their support for tangible Government action on Palestine. It is impossible to ignore evidence that solidarity with Palestine is an important political issue for Irish people. We want to be able to present this proof to political parties ahead of the upcoming local, European and general elections in the South along with a demand that they include commitments to recognise Israeli apartheid and to enact the occupied territories Bill in their election manifestoes and in the next programme for Government. The pledge is available at amnesty.ie. Amnesty along with many other groups will be outside Leinster House at 1 p.m. today as part of the Picnics against Apartheid event. I encourage Members to come out and show their support. Tomorrow I will be circulating the pledge among Members. I will ask Members to, please, sign on and share it far and wide. Empty words of condemnation mean nothing. The pledge is a commitment for moral clarity and tangible action. I ask Members today to sign up.

Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein)
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Well said.

Mark Wall (Labour)
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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.

Sharon Keogan (Independent)
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Last Monday, the Joint Committee on Health published a report on its pre-legislative scrutiny on the health and so-called safe access zones legislation. The report is not a great advertisement that the safe access zone legislation should go ahead. It seems that the committee’s job is just to grease the wheels of that process. It contains one weak recommendation of how the provisions of the Bill might be enforced in practice but the report completely ignores the elephant in the room, namely, that the proposals in the Bill are most certainly unconstitutional by infringing on the freedoms of speech, association and religion. I inform the Leader that the Dáil and the Seanad are bound by the Constitution not to pass legislation which we believe to be unconstitutional and yet in the 24 pages of the health committee's report, there is not so much as a comma of consideration given to the possibility that the Bill might be unconstitutional. That is despite the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, telling us here in the Seanad in February 2022 that An Garda Síochána believes that the proposal is unconstitutional and would not survive a legal challenge.

The Minister recently told the Dáil that he had five meetings with the Attorney General between October 2022 and January 2023 to specifically discuss this Bill. The only reason they would have met so often is because clearly there is a very significant question mark over the constitutionality of this Bill. Two submissions to the Joint Committee on Health, one by the Presbyterian Church and another by the pro-life campaign, pointed out the constitutionality problem. The latter's submission contained seven full pages of analysis showing that the Bill’s constitutionality is severely in doubt. I ask the Leader what it says about the process of pre-legislative scrutiny when such a glaring potential problem, which the Minister himself has flagged, is completely ignored by an Oireachtas committee. Furthermore, did the committee seriously think that the issue of constitutionality was even worthy of a mention? Did any of its members read the submission pointing this problem out? Why is there nothing in the report on this issue? I value the work done by all committees within these Houses but why waste anybody’s time by going through the process where the decisions and outcomes are already decided before the process begins?

Micheál Carrigy (Fine Gael)
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First of all, I welcome Terri and Patrick from the transition year class in Mercy Secondary School, Ballymahon who are here with me today to see behind the scenes in Leinster House.

I was not here yesterday to speak on the GAAGO issue. As treasurer of my own GAA club, I was out selling lotto tickets last Sunday evening. I am also a former chairperson of the Longford hurling board. I have gone to Croke Park with Longford GAA and I am involved with the underage game at home. My young fellow plays hurling with the Westmeath and Roscommon league because we have only a small number of clubs in Longford. The GAA constitutes more than one sport. It includes Gaelic football, handball, rounders and Scór. These are all sports which need to be supported. I am disappointed with what I see nearly as a witch-hunt, to be honest, in the media against the GAA. There is more to the GAA than just a small number of counties which play at the highest level. Some 32 counties play hurling plus Warwickshire, Lancashire and London. Gaelic football is played by 32 counties plus New York and London. We also have international clubs throughout the world. This is a massive organisation which needs to be supported and funded. To be honest, I am disappointed. GAAGO was put in place to ensure that more games are available for us to watch. Many of the people who have made comments about the cost of GAAGO, which was €55 before Christmas for all of the games, probably have Sky Sports and are paying €480 a year to watch Premier League soccer. A very small amount was being sought to allow people to look at more GAA games. Some 83% of the revenue which the GAA takes in goes back out to its clubs. This includes the money earned through GAAGO. A multi-million euro outlay is required to provide all of these games. As I have said, I am the treasurer of my own football club. I know about the funding we get from the GAA. Over the past two years, we have received a refund of up to €10,000 on our club insurance to ensure our club survives to be able to provide sports for our young people.

The Limerick-Clare game has been mentioned as one of the games over which there was a major issue. That game was initially fixed for the Sunday and was meant to be free-to-air on RTÉ but because of another event in Limerick, the Great Limerick Run, it was moved to the Saturday. As a result, RTÉ showed a different game live on the Sunday. The GAA took the decision to put the Limerick-Clare game on GAAGO so that people would be able to see it. The game was actually moved from free-to-air because it was clashing with an event in Limerick on foot of a request to do so. The reality is that the number of games on free-to-air television has not reduced in recent years. I would like people to bear in mind what the GAA gives to every community in our country and throughout the world. We need to stop what I feel is a witch-hunt against the organisation.

Maria Byrne (Fine Gael)
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I congratulate the students of Laurel Hill Secondary School - Aisling, Maebh and Vivian - who won the gold medal at the SciFest regional final of the EirGrid: Climate and Delivering a Cleaner Energy Future competition for their project, "Turn it off or keep it on - which is more energy efficient?". Science, technology, engineering and mathematics, STEM, projects are very much about our future. I wish the three students all the very best in the national final where they will represent their school and the region.

When representatives of Transport Infrastructure Ireland, TII, appeared before Dublin City Council recently to speak about contactless payments on buses, they said it will be a number of years before TII will be able to introduce contactless payments. Given that in the majority of cases, people now use their cards for contactless payments everywhere they go, this needs to be progressed sooner rather than later, and not into the future. I do not think it is very appropriate to say that it will be a few years down the road because buses are used every day.

Some Members have raised the issue of concrete defects. I was involved with the residents in The Meadows in the Corbally area of Limerick with respect to the pyrite resolution scheme. It is welcome that work is now commenced on their houses. I thank the Department and the Minister, and the former Minister of State, Deputy English, who at the time was involved in the work that has happened. The residents of the 18 houses where work is being carried out have had to move out of their homes for up to six months, but at least they will have the defects in their houses corrected. I thank the Government for the help and support for the residents in that scheme.

Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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Before I call the next Senator, I welcome the sixth class students of Dulargy Mixed National School, Ravensdale, County Louth who are visiting Seanad Éireann today. Senator McGahon spoke to me earlier and proposed that there should be no homework for the rest of the week. I would like to support that proposal. I hope that the teachers, Alison Matthews and Eimear McGuinness, will abide by the Senator’s wishes. They are all most welcome today. We are trying to get support from every possible angle here today but one school at a time is the way we will approach this one. I call Senator Boylan.

Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein)
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I would like to use today's Order of Business to ask the Leader to consider allocating time in the Seanad for statements on the report of the Citizens' Assembly on Biodiversity Loss, which was released recently. There were 150 recommendations in the report. The report also rightly highlighted the failure of this State to adequately fund, implement and enforce existing laws and directives. Ireland thrives on our reputation internationally of being clean and green when we know that the reality is anything but. We only have to look at our water quality, our beaches and our rivers. Sixty-three per cent of our bird populations are in decline, while 25% of them are in serious decline. Invasive species in this country are poorly managed and rhododendron and sika deer are destroying what is left of our native woodland. Killarney National Park should be the jewel in the crown of the national parks in this country, but instead rhododendron has been allowed to reinfest acres of native oak woodland, thereby undoing 25 years' work of volunteers, including the work I did with Groundwork, an organisation affiliated to the Irish Wildlife Trust. It is interesting that right next door to Killarney National Park a single individual, Mr. Eoghan Daltun, has proved what can be done when you protect against grazing and tackle invasive species. Mr. Daltun is now recreating the Atlantic rainforest that Ireland once was so fortunate to be covered in, but which is now being neglected.

Also, we see that the Office of Public Works, OPW, believes that the law does not apply to it. In numerous cases which I have highlighted in this House, the OPW has blatantly ignored the law by proceeding with work without applying for bat derogation licences. In the case of Emo Court, it was told to cease and desist and proceeded to carry out the works anyway. Somebody within the National Parks and Wildlife Service and the Departments of the Environment, Climate and Communications and Housing, Local Government and Heritage decided not to prosecute even though we had a report from the ranger recommending prosecution in that case. It is timely that we debate the biodiversity crisis that we have in this country and those 150 recommendations.

Tim Lombard (Fine Gael)
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This afternoon I would like to raise the issue of where we are going with food inflation and how that issue will be debated, in particular in the next few weeks. It is an issue that this House should take a lead on. We should have a real, significant debate with the Ministers involved regarding food inflation. Our primary producers need to be protected in this debate. I am genuinely concerned about where these primary producers will go regarding this debate.

We cannot have a scenario where we will decide we will solve the food inflation issue by putting the burden straight back on our primary producers. I will give an example of where our product is going at present. The price of milk, which was 58 cent a litre - an all-time high - three months ago, has dropped 27.5% at the farmer's gate. It is now down to 41 cent, with another cut coming in the next few days. It will be at cost price by the end of May. That is a significant issue for the agricultural community that I represent. When you have this debate regarding price inflation, we have to take a look at who will be affected if they push this straight back on farmers' gates. It will have a serious impact on our industry.

What should happen is that the profits in the multinational supermarket chains that are in Ireland should be published in Ireland. We need to know what these multinationals are making. Legislation should be put in place to ensure that supermarkets have their profits published so that we know where the money is being made. We know where the money is not being made. The money is not being made at the primary producer's gate. If dairy farmers in Cork are getting 40 cent a litre next May and there is to be another price cut, we will have a scenario where these people will be at cost price. When you go to the supermarket, you are paying €2.20 for 2 litres of milk. It is leaving the farm gate at 80 cent. Somebody is making an awful lot of money from the farmer's gate all the way to the supermarket chain. If we had a labelling system to set out who makes what on the food chain, it might help the consumer to understand where the issues are. One thing is for sure. The primary producer is not making the money. We need to have a significant debate on how we can support the primary producer.

I firmly believe that the liquid milk product we have at present will not be all Irish in a few years' time. I cannot see the sustainability for Irish dairy farmers to be involved in liquid milk production because of the movement within the market chain. Due to the supermarkets and their movement, I think they will move from liquid milk into manufacturing milk which will mean we will have to import milk at the corners of the year because we will not have enough milk in Ireland for our own economy. If that happens because of what we are doing here, it will be a thundering disgrace.

John McGahon (Fine Gael)
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I would like to discuss the rural regeneration applications that go through the Department of Rural and Community Development under the Minister, Deputy Humphreys. Millions of euro have been pumped into communities right around this country. In my own county of Louth, €30 million from that Department has gone into rural regeneration projects. The issue I have with the scheme is that it is down to the local authorities to pick a village and put the application in. It is done through the local authority. The local authority may have a little too much power in that instance because it can pick its top two or three towns or its top four villages and specifically direct funding towards them. While those villages need it and I welcome it, we should expand the scheme and open it up a bit more so that Tidy Towns initiatives or community groups can apply for that funding. That would open up the process and make it fairer. It would allow projects to be judged on their merits in a local community in a local area rather than perhaps a local authority putting only one project forward that it knows will get funding. Why not have an open competition, let different villages compete against each other and let the process be that bit fairer? There is nothing wrong with opening it up. Where you have really good community groups, really good Tidy Towns organisations and really good business investment districts, they should be able to put applications like that in for schemes. It should not be dominated by a local authority which can decide what villages are going in, and in what years, at its discretion.

Lisa Chambers (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Members who contributed to the Order of Business today.

Senator Malcolm Byrne acknowledged the work of some primary schools in his own county of Wexford - Kilrane National School near Rosslare Europort and Bunscoil Loreto in Gorey - which have taken in a considerable number of Ukrainian students, and more than maybe other schools across the country. The Senator acknowledged the work they have done, in particular Bunscoil Loreto, which celebrated Europe Day by singing "Ode to Joy" in six languages. It is a remarkable achievement for the school and I offer my congratulations to them. It has put significant pressure on our school community, with nearly 15,000 new students in the country. I commend the teachers, the students and those school communities on doing their best to make those children feel welcome and to look after them. It is very important. I hear the Senator's call to introduce Ukrainian as a language at second level. It is an interesting suggestion, and certainly one for the Department to consider. It might be worth a Commencement matter as it is quite a specific request.

Senator McDowell raised the Garda Reserve, prison overcrowding, the impact of the housing crisis and the influx of refugees into tourist accommodation. A request has gone to the Department of Justice for a debate on the Garda Reserve and prison overcrowding and we are waiting. There will be a change of Minister in the coming weeks and it will depend on the Department getting a date from them as to which Minister we will get.

Michael McDowell (Independent)
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We do not often see the Minister, Deputy Harris, here.

Lisa Chambers (Fianna Fail)
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The request has gone in. We would be delighted to get the Minister, Deputy Harris, if he can make himself available in the coming weeks, but it may be the Minister, Deputy McEntee, if it does not happen. We certainly get somebody on those important topics.

I would agree with the Senator that the level of reservists, in terms of the Reserve Defence Force and the Garda Reserve, and the volunteerism that we have benefited from as a country over so many decades is certainly in decline. Numbers have reduced considerably in both organisations to the detriment of communities and it is in all of our interests to make sure that those organisations work.

The impact of the housing crisis and the accommodation being given to Ukrainian refugees and international protection applicants is putting considerable pressure on the tourist sector. I believe that was on the front page of the Irish Independentyesterday. It has been raised in many local authorities. There is a particular issue in my own area as well, in County Mayo. I am aware that in Kerry and Donegal there are significantly higher numbers because of the timing of it. We faced the most pressure in terms of people coming into the country at a time when, because of the seasonal nature of the business, many hotels in these counties had vacancies and had beds. Needs must. We had to give people somewhere to stay, and to house people. However, it will put pressure on. Obviously, those providing the accommodation are getting paid. They will get paid from the Department. It is lucrative, from what I understand, and it is consistent. It is quite easy to manage.It is an easy space to be in for accommodation providers. The issue is with the ancillary or knock-on business such as the coffee shop, souvenir shop, pub or restaurant. They rely on tourists coming in with money in their back pocket to spend locally. I think we can all accept that for this tourist season of 2023, we are where we are and that accommodation is not going to be available this year. We need to hear from the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media as to what her plans are for the tourism sector for next year and the year after and what the plan is for housing people so they are not taking up tourist accommodation. The request has gone into her office and we are awaiting a response. I have requested that she come before the House next Thursday, as she is not available on the Wednesday. We will get a date for that debate, be it in the form of statements or motion. We will ensure the issue is heard because many Members raised it again yesterday. We have foresight now on an issue that will become an even greater problem next year. We should do something about it when we have the opportunity to do so. I understand that the Joint Committee on Tourism, Culture, Arts, Sport and Media is also dealing with the matter and it is being debated by members of that committee as well. We will look to get that addressed in the House.

Senator Paddy Burke asked for a debate on health services. We will get the Minister in at the earliest opportunity. There are significant issues in many emergency departments across the country, Castlebar being one of them. I am aware of the calls for people not to come into the hospital unless they absolutely have to. We should not really be telling people to stay away. If they need to come in, they need to come in. There is also an issue with cancer services in the region. There was a public meeting in Galway on Monday night last, which I attended with many Oireachtas Members and councillors from across the region, where the need for a new facility in UHG was raised. That hospital serves the entire region, from Galway right up to the Inishowen Peninsula in County Donegal and everywhere in between. The most complex care is provided in Galway for those patients but the facilities are outdated and not fit for purpose. The staff and the care are second to none but the facilities they are operating out of are not. I encourage Members to visit if they can because it is quite eye-opening to see the mismatch of prefabs and buildings that were supposed to be temporary or were put in 60 years ago or more and are still being used.

There are calls locally for a brand-new cancer centre. I am pleased that it is the only cancer centre in the national development plan. There has been progress in advancing the site. The HSE board has signed off on the strategic assessment for the site and that is now with the Department of Health for progress. We await the appointment of a design team and funding for same, hopefully in the coming weeks. We would hope to see the project progressed at the earliest opportunity. It brings into question the onerous task of moving through the public spending code because this is a project that will cost well in excess of €200 million and will be required to go through all stages. It takes far too long - a minimum at the minute of seven years - to bring a project to its beginning. That is not to completion; that is to start a project. This is something we need to look at. If we want to develop key strategic infrastructure like health services, we need to move through the public spending code at a faster pace. Under the auspices of saving money for the public, we end up with projects costing more because they take longer to deliver. We are not serving anybody with that type of delay.

Senator Gavan raised the issue of the family resource centres and the important work they do. They have been doing fantastic work in many communities, as he rightly said, in assisting those who have come looking for shelter in our country, including Ukrainian refugees and international protection applicants. They have been great in reaching out to those families who are very vulnerable and who are trying to get set up in a brand-new country. In my own town of Castlebar, we have a fantastic centre and that is also true right across the country. The request for an increase in core funding is reasonable. The money being talked about is minor in the grand scheme of things. It might be good to table a Commencement matter in the next couple of weeks, just to get the debate started, but I have no doubt that we will debate this in the context of the budget in the coming months.

I take on board the Senator's point about the Tesco workers. I am not familiar with those cases so again, that may be one for a Commencement matter to see what the Minister with responsibility is doing to assist those workers with that particular matter.

Senator Black raised the issue of Israel and Palestine. She said she will circulate a pledge for Members to consider and that there will also be a demonstration that she is asking Members to consider attending.

Senator Wall raised three different issues, including the Not Her Fault campaign and apartment defects. There was a debate with the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage in recent weeks so it will be some time before we get him back in on that but I know he is working extremely hard to get that scheme moving. It has been funded. It is up and running but I understand there are some teething problems in terms of access and getting it moving at the pace people need it to move at.

The Senator also called for sports facilities to be part of every town plan and said that towns with a population of more than 5,000 should have a sports facility assigned in the plan. He also raised the issue of national register for AEDs and the important role they play in keeping people safe in communities.

Senator Keogan spoke about the pre-legislative scrutiny of the safe access zone legislation. That work is being done by a cross-party Oireachtas committee. We can take it that that work has been done diligently, which I note it has been. It is a contentious issue. There will never be agreement on this. There are calls for safe access zones, not to restrict people's right to assemble, freedom of expression or speech or freedom of religion, but to protect people accessing health services. If someone is going to debate the legitimacy of public policy or legislation, the place to do that is where that policy and legislation is put together and that is here, not outside hospitals. I understand there are different views on the issue and I respect that.

Senator Carrigy spoke about the GAA and the premium pay service. This issue was also raised yesterday. Most Members yesterday took a different view to him but I respect the level of involvement he and his family have had with the GAA over many years.

Senator Maria Byrne wished the three students of Laurel Hill Secondary School well. They are heading on to the final now so I wish them well on that. Hopefully they get all the way. I agree with the Senator's comments about TII saying it would take years to bring in contactless payments. That is unusual because even at the smallest level, local sports clubs can do contactless payments now when they are doing a raffle. If they can manage it everywhere else, I do not understand what the delay is there. Maybe there is a cost issue but people expect to be able to pay by card now. If someone is paying by cash on the bus they sometimes pay a bit more and there is probably a little bit of extra money coming in because of it because they do not do change. I do not know if that is a factor but there is no excuse for taking so long.

It is great to see that the pyrite scheme in Limerick has been successful and that 18 homes are being remedied. I send my best wishes to those individuals and families who are getting their homes corrected.

Senator Boylan asked for statements on the Citizens' Assembly on Biodiversity Loss. We will get those statements at the earliest opportunity. I commend Aoibhinn Ní Shúilleabháin, who is the chair of the assembly and the citizens who took part in that work. I heard her on the farming segment on RTÉ radio a few weeks ago discussing the work. I know a lot of work went into all of the hearings. Many hours of work went into putting that report together and it is a really important piece of work. They did a fantastic job. I look forward to that debate in the House. I think there will be a lot of interest in it, in debating the report's findings and even in the negative comments. We need to hear that stuff and hear what we are not doing well and what we can do better.

Senator Lombard asked for a debate on food inflation and called for primary producers not to suffer when getting food costs back down to where they need to be.

Finally, Senator McGahon spoke about rural regeneration and the millions of euro from the Department of Social Protection that have gone to communities across the country. He suggested that there should be open competition between villages and towns to access the money. I disagree with the Senator on that front. Local authorities should have a coherent plan based on evidence and reason and there should be a reason a project is advanced in a particular area. It should be done in consultation with the local community. It is not a good idea to pitch one village against another that may be slightly better organised but that may not be the best place for the project. It is a matter for the local representatives to work with council management in ensuring every part of the local authority area gets its fair share of funding and the projects are advanced everywhere, not just in those areas that speak the loudest.