The Order of Business is No. 1, motion regarding the arrangements for the sitting of the House on Thursday, 19 October 2023, to be taken without debate on the conclusion of the Order of Business; and No. 2, statements on the final report of the independent scoping exercise into the circumstances surrounding the death of Mr. Shane O'Farrell, to be taken at 7 p.m. and to conclude not later than 8.30 p.m., if not previously concluded, with the time allocated to the opening remarks of the Minister not to exceed ten minutes, those of group spokespersons not to exceed eight minutes, those of all other Senators not to exceed three minutes - time can be shared - and the Minister to be given not less than ten minutes to reply to the debate.
An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business
I accept the business that has been set out by the Leader.
I wish to raise the following issue. A Chathaoirligh, you may have noticed from recent media reports that there is an impasse at the University of Limerick whereby the governing authority has failed to select the name put forward for appointment to chancellor, as set out in the legislation. However, while the legislation sets out the procedures to elect a chancellor, it does not seem to set out a strategy in the event of the governing authority not accepting via a two thirds majority the name that is put forward. I ask the Leader, if possible, to arrange a debate on this issue and perhaps bring the Minister here for discussion and debate.
I just wanted to raise that one issue. Senator O'Loughlin was going to lead off on behalf of our party. I will sit down and she will complete the contribution, if that is permissible-----
You may not do that, unfortunately. You may keep going. You have another minute and 45 seconds.
Then I ask the Leader to arrange a debate in the House with the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science to address what appears to be a lacuna at the moment that creates a difficulty for the ongoing operation of the university, since no chancellor is in place and the legislation, as I outlined, does not appear to have an inbuilt solution to address the matter. If we could have that debate at the earliest opportunity, I would be grateful.
I call for a debate with the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, Deputy Harris, on the appropriateness of withholding funding from Irish higher education institutes, HEIs, which have not been rubber-stamped by a British NGO. The NGO in question is Advance HE, which supervises Athena SWAN. It was founded in 2018 as a merger of the UK's Equality Challenge Unit, Higher Education Academy and Leadership Foundation for Higher Education. Not only is it an English NGO, it is one whose origins are directly linked to and funded by the British State. The Athena SWAN charter sets out the standards of gender equality an entity must attain to be awarded a bronze, silver or gold award from Advance HE, which the entity, such as a HEI, can then wave around before going home and sticking it on the fridge.
That was the position until 7 April 2022, when the Minister, Deputy Harris, deemed it necessary to eliminate or severely restrict funding to HEIs that do not possess an Athena SWAN award.
He stated in written reply to a parliamentary question that "Only higher education institutions that have at least an Athena SWAN bronze institutional award can apply for funding from Ireland’s main research funders."
This hitherto functionally useless award handed out by a leftist British NGO is now an essential prerequisite for every Irish university, college and institute that wishes to apply for funding from the country’s main research funders. This might not be so bad if the provisions of the charter were truly about gender equality, providing that women and men are of equal value and that we should ensure this is reflected in society. No. Rather, the charter busies itself with the West’s ubiquitous question du jour, radical gender ideology, and states universities must commit to recognising that individuals can determine their gender identify and to tackling issues faced by trans and non-binary people. Why on earth ought this be a criterion for an Irish educational institution to be given State funding? As Dr. Matt Treacy writes:
Believing that a biological man or woman, possibly suffering from the psychiatric condition known as gender dysphoria, can simply decide that they are of a different gender is a subjective and ideologically based opinion. It is not a scientific fact, and nor ought public affirmation of it be a criteria for anything, least of all the granting of Irish taxpayers money to universities.
Research funding is the lifeblood of universities so the message from the Minister is simple: take the ideological soup or die in the cold. This would be an outrageous suggestion from anyone. The fact it has been made policy by the Minister responsible for funding the HEIs is beyond parody. The Minister needs to come into the HSE and answer that question.
It is good to know we are dealing with the big issues.
Funding is a big issue.
As I will not be here on Thursday, I want to talk about what is happening in Gaza today. I will start with two quotes. I think we all received the first last Thursday from the mission of the state of Palestine, which wrote to us:
We reject the practices of killing civilians or abusing them on both sides because they contravene morals, religion and international law. We renounce violence and adhere to international legitimacy, peaceful popular resistance, and political action as a path to achieving our national goals.
That is a perfectly reasonable and sensible statement and I endorse every word that the mission of the state of Palestine said in relation to what has happened in the past week.
The second quote is from an editorial in Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper, and is particularly interesting:
The disaster that befell Israel... is the clear responsibility of one person: Benjamin Netanyahu. The prime minister, who has prided himself on his vast political experience and irreplaceable wisdom in security matters, completely failed to identify the dangers he was consciously leading Israel into when establishing a government of annexation and dispossession... while embracing a foreign policy that openly ignored the existence and rights of Palestinians.
I read that into the record to show there is a breadth of opinion within Israel and a significant portion of it does not support the horrendous actions we are witnessing in Gaza.
The numbers change all the time. It looked like 2,800 deaths this morning; at least 800 children, perhaps more; plus 1,000 missing from Gaza. Eight hundred children have been killed in the past week and President Biden is choosing tomorrow to go over and show his steadfast support for Israel, after seeing 800 children murdered by carpet bombing in Gaza. That is what is happening. We are seeing ethnic cleansing and mass murder in relation to one nation, Palestine. It is appalling. To be clear, I condemn all violence in relation to this over the past week.
I know European leaders are meeting this afternoon and the Taoiseach is involved. Surely the call all of us must endorse is for an immediate ceasefire on all sides and the release of hostages. If we do not, we are somehow implying it is okay for Israel to continue carpet bombing and perhaps to invade Gaza as it plans to do. By the time the House debates this on Thursday, how many more hundreds of children will have died? There is hard work going on to agree a motion and I hope we can agree one across the parties. Surely we can all agree the call from Europe must be for an immediate ceasefire on all sides and the release of hostages. If Europe cannot agree to that, then I urge a coalition of the willing.
The Irish Government should be part of that demand for peace and an immediate ceasefire.
I too want to raise the situation in Gaza. A lot of words have been used in the past ten days and, of course, the World Health Organization came out today to describe the situation as a human catastrophe. We need to reflect on what those words really mean - a deprivation of the most basic means to subsist, a lack of water, a lack of electricity and hospitals facing the prospect of closing over the next 24 hours. It is outrageous that we are seeing the Israeli Government perpetuate a collective punishment on all of the people in Gaza.
Of course, people are hurting on all sides. The provocative barbarity of Hamas has to be condemned, and I think most of us condemn it. However, the actions of the Israeli Government cannot continue. Senator Gavan is right that time is of the essence, and I support the efforts to try to come up with a motion for Thursday's debate in the House. There has to be a cessation of violence now and there has to be peace. I know people have different views on what that peace needs to look like, but we are witnessing the annihilation of a people in Gaza at this point in time by an Israeli Government. That has to be called out and it has to stop.
The other issue that I want to raise concerns the section 39 organisations. We thought this morning that we were facing into yet another strike and, thankfully, we are not. It is to the enormous credit of SIPTU, Fórsa and the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation that they brokered a deal very late last night but it is outrageous that the Government forced these workers into such a situation. In talking to some of the organisations over recent days, they have reported a fivefold increase in union membership over the past two years of this campaign to try to get pay parity and pay fairness within section 39 organisations. There is something in that, which is that when workers come together, they can achieve something.
I call for a debate with the Minister for Health. We have had a shocking set of public pronouncements in recent days, most notably on Sunday by the chief executive of the HSE, who said the budget agreed for the HSE next year is a fiction and that they have budgeted for a deficit. We need to hear from the Minister, Deputy Donnelly, who is charged with negotiating the budget for our health services next year. We all know the impact on our services of the shortages at the moment, but given the shortages that are going to arise when we do not even have money in the health service to stand still next year, let alone meet the massive recruitment need, we need to hear from the Minister what he proposes to do about that.
On behalf of the Civil Engagement Group, I call Senator Flynn.
I again raise the issue of Travellers in education. Unfortunately, we have not received a reply from the Minister for Education, Deputy Foley. In the past three weeks, we sent two emails requesting a meeting or some kind of communication so we can look to deal with the inequalities that the Traveller community still faces in our education system today. Is it possible that the Leader would write to the Minister? I understand from colleagues that, to be fair, it is common practice that it can take any Minister a week or a week and a half to reply, but to make us wait three weeks since our initial email is not kind. We need to get her around the table to have a conversation about the next steps for Travellers in education. If the Leader could support that, I would very much appreciate it.
I welcome the members of the Association of Marine Pilots Ireland, who are guests of Senator Craughwell, to the Visitors Gallery and thank them for the very important work they do on our behalf, especially around the Port of Cork.
We now move to the two-minute slots with one item. I call Senator O'Loughlin.
Thank you. I know the Cathaoirleach will give me the spare minute that Senator Dooley had left.
I will not. It is a two-minute slot with one item.
You are very hard on me.
I am not.
You absolutely are, given I saved your skin earlier during the Commencement debate.
On a serious note, it is nine days since the horrific Hamas attack. The scenes that are unfolding on our screens, phones and televisions and reported in newspapers are shocking in terms of the atrocities that have been committed, the children who have been murdered and the people who have been held hostage. Let us think about Gandhi's words "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind," and that is exactly what is happening at the moment.
We have all received a lot of emails. One of the most poignant emails that I have received, as I know many of us did, was from an 11-year-old boy called Rian Tighe, an Irish boy who lives in Portugal. He asked what is wrong with the world and said that boys and girls his age should be thinking about football or wanting to meet someone like Lionel Messi as opposed to seeing bombs and people being killed. The boy begged all of us to do what we could to ensure that peace would happen. That is a very important message from a young boy who cares about his peers who live in Gaza and Israel.
I want to raise section 39 workers.
Senator, thank you.
I have 25 seconds and I want to speak about the importance of supporting section 39 workers.
To clarify, it is one item per Member in the two-minute slots and that is the item the Senator has raised. I am being consistent with the application of the Orders of the House.
So the Cathaoirleach is giving me four seconds.
.
An Cathaoirleach: No, I am not.
So the Cathaoirleach is not giving me anything.
I am not having a row.
You are having a row.
Senator, it is a two-minute slot now and Members can raise one item. I am applying that consistently across the board and not being unfair to anybody. Thank you, I appreciate the Senator's co-operation. It is not just me but that is the way of the House and if the Senator wants to change it then I have no problem with that. Has the Senator concluded?
I am not allowed to speak any more.
Go raibh maith agat.
I thank the Cathaoirleach for welcoming the marine pilots to the House. Few people in Ireland are aware of the work done by this special group of highly-skilled people who are responsible for the safe navigation of some 97% of our imports and exports through ports, including the Cathaoirleach's Port of Cork, and major harbours. The Cathaoirleach and I spoke about that this morning and I was grateful for his support in that area. Having spoken to the chaps today, I realise that there are little harbours around the country, and virtually unknown harbours around the country, where pilots work all day every day to ensure the safe passage of ships into and out of Ireland.
This small group of professionals generally do not come to the attention of politicians or the Oireachtas in general but there is a serious need for us to look at marine piloting in Ireland with respect to the legislation and the regulation that is required. I now lay before the House my intention over the coming weeks and months, for as long as we are here, to raise issues with respect to the pilots and to seek that we put them on a footing equal to the best in Europe. We should be the best in Europe. We are an island nation but we are not. I hope that we can all work with these men over the coming months, while this Oireachtas lasts, and see to it that we put piloting on a footing that it should be on. As they are only a small group of fewer than 50 people sometimes they slip through the cracks or fall below the radar so I ask that we all take an interest in this in the coming months.
Next is Senator Maria Byrne and she has two minutes on one item.
I rise today to congratulate and thank the Irish rugby team for the pleasure that they have given us over the past number of weeks with their participation in the Rugby World Cup. While many people were disappointed over the weekend certainly they gave us their all.
I pay tribute to Johnny Sexton and wish him well in his retirement. I also pay tribute to Munster's own Keith Earls who has announced his retirement and confirmed that today. I also pay tribute to his wife, Edel, their family, his mother, Sandra, his father, Ger, and to the clubs that he played with. He paid tribute to various clubs ranging from Young Munster, to Garryowen, to Thomond and to his own school of St. Munchin's College. Keith has been an inspiration to many young sports people male and female.
I thank him. He played more than 100 games for his country and togged out for his club and province on so many occasions. He has been an inspirational player. The end of the road has probably come for Keith in terms of playing rugby, but I believe we will still see him involved, whether on the sideline, in training or whatever. He has helped so many young people because he has spoken about his mental health. That is a very hard thing for an active sports person to talk about. He has been quite open and is an inspiration to so many. I wish him well in his retirement.
Senator Dooley kicked off the Order of Business by speaking about the University of Limerick and the lack of clarity regarding the appointment of a chancellor there. I might suggest that he table a Commencement matter on that. It is quite a specific question, and I do not have full details of the circumstances as to why that appointment has not been made. I take on board the Senator's comments.
Senator Keogan referred to higher education and requested that the Minister come before the House. I will make the request for the debate. I cannot answer the questions she has posed. It really is a matter for the Minister as regards the funding of higher education institutions and the requirement to meet certain criteria from that particular non-governmental organisation. We will certainly request the debate and make the Minister aware of the topic the Senator has raised.
Senators Gavan and Sherlock raised the issue of Gaza. In the aftermath of the horrific attack by Hamas on innocent Israeli civilians, the budget was introduced on Tuesday last. For politicians, budget day is a big day in the political calendar. I was really struck by the fact that Israel and Gaza, not the budget, was the top issue raised by every person in this House. It goes to show how gripped and affected Irish people are by this issue. It is on the front pages of all the newspapers for the past ten days now. Even in this House, everybody will be aware that we are circulating motions, with different groups and parties trying to find a way to get our voices heard and get our views on the record. We will have a debate in the House on Thursday with the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs on the issue. For the most part, I think everybody is on the same page regarding the issue. We have always have a strong connection as a country with the Palestinian people.
In saying that, however, it would be wrong and immoral to simply brush over or move on too quickly from what happened in Israel on that Saturday and the brutality of that attack. It is difficult to imagine how a human being could inflict the harm that those soldiers or, in my view, terrorists, inflicted on children, babies and older people. It is difficult to imagine how somebody could perpetrate those actions. It was absolutely barbaric and sent shock waves right across the globe. There is huge solidarity and sympathy with the people of Israel on foot of that attack.
Our attention now turns to the retaliation, what looks like collective punishment and the blockade of aid into Gaza, which is also wrong and is not going to bring about a resolution. Senator Gavan spoke about President Biden's visit to Israel in a very negative light. I would take a different view of the matter. My understanding is that the US President intervened to ensure that water supplies were turned on for a period. It is my understanding that Western leaders are doing everything they can through diplomatic channels to try to get Israel to act within international law, respect the Geneva Convention and ensure that civilians are protected. People are doing their best, and also acknowledging that Israel has a right to defend itself. As we know, the position and stated objective of Hamas, which is a terrorist organisation, is to wipe Israel off the map. It is very difficult to see how one could negotiate with that particular terrorist organisation. Many Members over the course of last week and this have made the point that Hamas is not the Palestinian people. The suggestion that they would have a democratic mandate is long out of date. They have not been to the polls since 2005 at least. It is not a functioning democracy as we would understand it. It is an extremely complicated position. We will have a chance on Thursday to really articulate that position.
Senator Sherlock referred to the strike by workers in section 39 organisations that was averted in the early hours of this morning. I commend the unions and the Government on getting that deal done and the workers on bringing the issue forward. Equal pay for equal work is something for which we all stand. Among service users, there is widespread relief across the country that there will be no strike action today. The relevant services are vital to people in being able to get out of bed, live their lives and function day to day. Credit is due to all sides, with people working through the night to get the deal done and avert strike action today. It is a positive, good news story that the strike was called off right across the country.
Senator Flynn raised an issue relating to Travellers and education. I did not know she raised the same issue last week. I cannot answer regarding a response to her letter to the Minister but I am sure the latter is working on getting back to the Senator. I do not see there being a difficulty with having a meeting on that issue. The Oireachtas committee is dealing with the same topic. The Senator's comments are always well considered and, on this issue, she comes from a position of having lived it. She is representing her community. There is a long way to go in ensuring the education system is working for all our children. That certainly does not happen in all aspects, not just for the Traveller community but also in deprived areas. We have a way to go to ensure there is true equality.
Senator Sherlock asked for a debate on health. There has been a lot of conversation around the provisions for health in the budget announced last Tuesday. An additional €2 billion was allocated but that seems to get brushed over to a certain extent. We must acknowledge the challenges arising from the inflation that is putting up the cost of everything. Every Minister was looking for funding for his or her Department. The waiting list action, which was a critical request from the Minister for Health, will be funded. It will work to take pressure off emergency departments, which is a clear priority for the Department. Inflation is greater in healthcare than in other areas. That significant inflation is putting huge pressure on resources. There have been suggestions that the health budget was cut. That is not the case; more money was put into health. The issue is that just trying to stand still and maintain existing levels of service is a challenge. It would be a challenge for any government of the day. There must be an acknowledgement that huge money is going into health. That does not mean there are no challenges. It is also worth acknowledging that Ireland has the highest life expectancy of any member state in the EU. That is something of which to be proud. We have made huge strides and advancements over the past couple of decades in outcomes for patients from the main killers, that is, cancer, stroke, cardiac disease and diabetes. We are living better and longer. I acknowledge the challenges but there also are lots of good things happening in healthcare. In particular, there has been a focus on and funding for women's healthcare during this Government's term, with various brand-new initiatives we had not seen before, including the establishment of menopause clinics and endometriosis clinics. There is good news. It is not all negative but I take on board the points raised by Senator Sherlock.
Senator O'Loughlin referred to the email we all received from an 11-year-old Irish boy living in Portugal. Sometimes, seeing things through the eyes of a child gives us a good perspective on the world. One would wonder how we get things so wrong as we move on in life. She also acknowledged the section 39 workers and the strike action that was averted today, to which I referred.
Senator Craughwell spoke about marine pilots and the need to keep that issue on the agenda. Notwithstanding the small number of people affected, it is an important topic.
To end on a positive note, Senator Maria Byrne spoke about the Irish rugby team. I concur with her remarks and thank the team for the memories and the fantastic excitement the players gave us through the World Cup campaign. They were a joy to watch. Even people who are not that interested in rugby generally tuned in to watch the lads competing in France. They did us very proud. The final match was a fantastic game in a very competitive World Cup. The players who will not be togging out again for Ireland because they are retiring should be immensely proud. In particular, the captain, Johnny Sexton, has been a fantastic leader, sportsman and family man.
Hear, hear.
Everybody is very proud of the team and gutted for the players as well. It was a great game to watch. The result was disappointing but we have fantastic memories. This is a lovely note on which to end the Order of Business.
We would all agree with the Leader and Senator Maria Byrne that the display by the Irish rugby team over the past few weeks has been phenomenal. While the players were defeated on Saturday night, they have left a huge and impressive legacy. We salute and congratulate Johnny Sexton and Keith Earls on their retirement.
Order of Business agreed to.