Results 121-140 of 1,122,713 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Joe O'Brien OR speaker:Neasa Hourigan OR speaker:Simon Harris OR speaker:John McGuinness OR speaker:Paul Donnelly OR speaker:Michael Lowry OR speaker:Bríd Smith OR speaker:Micheál Martin OR speaker:Ossian Smyth OR speaker:James Lawless OR speaker:Hildegarde Naughton OR speaker:Thomas Byrne OR speaker:Danny Healy-Rae OR speaker:Cathal Berry OR speaker:Paul Murphy OR speaker:Marc MacSharry OR speaker:Christopher O'Sullivan OR speaker:James O'Connor OR speaker:Richard Bruton OR speaker:Chris Andrews OR speaker:Seán Canney OR speaker:Denis Naughten OR speaker:Dara Calleary OR speaker:Holly Cairns OR speaker:Alan Kelly OR speaker:Joe McHugh OR speaker:Alan Dillon OR speaker:Pat Buckley OR speaker:Patricia Ryan OR speaker:Duncan Smith OR speaker:Roderic O'Gorman OR speaker:Emer Higgins OR speaker:Willie O'Dea OR speaker:Darragh O'Brien OR speaker:Brian Leddin)

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Richard Bruton: I commend the Minister on the work he has done in the Department. He has made a real mark. We now have legislation and a framework for implementing our climate ambition. We have made significant progress and many good initiatives have been rolled out, such as the loan scheme that was recently put in place. It would be churlish not to recognise the effort, commitment and progress that the...

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Brian Leddin: I thank the Minister for that. There are no other questions on subhead B5. We will move on to subhead B11, which is the electricity credit. Do colleagues wish to come in on this one? Deputy O'Rourke is muted on our end. We will try to resolve this if the Deputy gives us a moment. He is back and we can hear him now.

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Richard Bruton: I commend the progress made on this by the Department. As the Minister rightly alluded, we had a considerable battle to get this approved, and I was gratified about a year ago to see the Minister's colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Ossian Smyth, issue a reply indicating that the present calculation of the benefits was double the benefits estimated at the time it was approved. That...

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Brian Leddin: I will add to Deputy Bruton's point if I may. It is a really important one about how often our projections are conservative and we do not decide to make these investments. We spoke about this in respect of the Minister's transport portfolio in the Dáil earlier. If we were conservative in doing our business case, analysis and feasibility, we might not make the investments. We might...

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Richard Bruton: I also advocated for the "disruptive technologies" programme, where €500 million-----

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Richard Bruton: We have medical device companies and ICT companies; we have wonderful resources. We are probably better placed than almost any state to think about a transformative programme in this area. It would be a low-cost toe in the water. It would be harder to integrate the State, as the Minister said, but it would be a good first step.

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Richard Bruton: Now that the Minister may have a little more time on his hands, he should listen to "The Rest is Politics - Leading", a podcast with Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell, and the interview they did with Audrey Tang, the digital Minister in Taiwan. What Taiwan did around the co-designing of solutions is well worth a listen. It is amazing what was achieved in a relatively short period.

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Estimates for Public Services 2024
Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications (Supplementary) (17 Oct 2024)

Brian Leddin: It is the first time I have heard the quadruple helix mentioned in the committee but hopefully not the last. It sounds very important. We have reached the end of our consideration of the Supplementary Estimates. I thank members for their questions, the Minister for his answers and the officials for attending. The last day the Minister was here I said my goodbyes so I will not repeat them....

Select Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment: Message to the Dáil (17 Oct 2024)

Brian Leddin: In accordance with Standing Order 101, the following message will be sent to the Dáil: The Select Committee on Environment and Climate Action has completed its consideration of the following Supplementary Estimates for public services for the year ending 31 December 2024: Vote 29 - Environment, Climate and Communications. Under Standing Order 100(2), the message is deemed to be the...

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: I welcome our witnesses. I have been considering this issue for a long time. There is a massive Irish diaspora living across the world. I can only speak for myself, but the minute your foot steps outside this country, you become more patriotic. It does not matter where you are on holidays. You become more patriotic and it is as simple as that. In its response, the Department mentioned...

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: Is that people who are still Irish passport holders living abroad?

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: As I said, people feel more patriotic the minute they step outside the country than they do when they come in.

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: That is a valid point. One would imagine, Chair, this would be a commonsense approach. If people still have their Irish passport with a reference number on it, that is a true identity document. Surely these people still have their PPS number as well. They should be able to vote online or go to the nearest embassy in whatever country they are in.

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: It is because they will not-----

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: There is a lack of political will. It would involve amending the Electoral Act 1963. I have just marked it in my notes to flag the matter. We can see whether that can be changed. As out guests have said, the digital age is so advanced now that I cannot see major costs being incurred.

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: People would log on to a Government website.

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: People in Spain, Portugal, Australia, New Zealand or wherever could log on to MyGovID, type in their PPS number and passport number, show their ID and cast their vote.

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: There is no politics at this committee. It is very good. On the response from the Department, reference was made to using MyGovID. It is a matter of putting another line in with a box, with, say, five names-----

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: In March 2017, the then Department of local government and housing and the Department of Foreign Affairs produced an options paper setting out what they called the broad range of options. Options are ideas and solutions but what got me were the references to voting rights, international comparisons, estimated costs and related resource issues, as well as legal, policy, administrative and...

Committee on Public Petitions: Consideration of Public Petition on Voting for Irish-born Citizens Abroad: Discussion (17 Oct 2024)

Pat Buckley: They listed all the problems and said they did not really want what was proposed.