Hear, hear.

I hope the issue will be resolved. It needs to be resolved. Everybody wants to be and is supportive of nurses. The capacity for empathy shown by one side of the House this morning is shared across the House. We are in government. Members of the Fianna Fáil Party were in government for long enough. Sinn Féin has not yet reached those dizzying heights here.

It will not be long.

Sinn Féin walked out of government in the North and has not been back in two years.

We walked out of government in the North in seeking marriage equality and language equality for citizens. We did what we had to do.

There is actually a great opportunity in the North to be in government.

It is a pity the vacuum in leadership in the North has not been filled.

By whom should it be filled?

That is a job for Sinn Féin to do.

It is. The Leader can join his mates down in-----

Westminster could do with the likes of Sinn Féin.

Níor chuala mé an Seanadóir Mullen.

We will return to the picket line and leave these matters for another day. The issue of the nurses strike should not be overshadowed.

The issue needs to be addressed. All of us stand with nurses in wanting the dispute to be resolved and in recognising and putting a value on the work they do. I hope this can be done in the short term because, as Senator Devine said, we do not want to go back to the days when Fianna Fáil was in power and we had nine days of disputes.

We also had nine nights.