I want to bring to the Leader's attention the Traveller Culture and History in Education Bill 2018, which was passed in the Seanad in 2019 by former Senator Colette Kelleher. Oein de Bhardúin also did a lot of work on that Bill. We got it through the Dáil thanks to Deputy Pringle and we are looking at Committee Stage of the Bill. Unfortunately the money message has come into play with the Traveller Culture and History in Education Bill 2018. We wrote to the Minister, as did Deputies, and unfortunately we have not received a reply. This is a critical Bill, not only so that young Travellers will feel more valued within the education system, but to educate all of the students within our schools. It might sound a bit stupid for me to say this but the benefit to people's culture, feeling valued and feeling part of a society in which we never felt accepted is more important than the few hundred or few thousand euro that the Department would be out. After everything we have been through as a community, it is worth it. I would like the Minister to rule out the money message. Money is being drawn down in further education and this morning I was speaking to a Cork disability group that wondered where the support was to draw down some of that higher education funding.

There is an awful lot of hatred and discrimination on our streets at present. It is very sad to be part of the Seanad during these horrible times but I want to use this platform for a positive note. I would encourage the Government and people in this House to send a positive message on their social media that we support refugees in our country. Divide and conquer and pitting communities against each other works for the Government, and I do not mean to sound bad by saying that. Everyone ends up talking about "them" and "us" instead of talking about what is happening at a higher level. Is it possible that we could get a campaign going? We always hear employment campaigns that state they are brought to you by the Government of Ireland and all that jazz. Is it possible that we could have a campaign that says refugees are welcome? I do not know what it would look like but that would be a positive message we could send to welcome refugees because after all, these people are fleeing war. They are in our country and it is up to us as a society to look after people who are here, who live here and who belong here. The Government could do a positive campaign.

I would like to ask the Leader to arrange, possibly in the new year now, a debate on the shared island movement. The shared island initiative was one of the Taoiseach and a sum of €500 million was set aside in the programme for Government for a number of projects that were aimed at benefiting communities North and South and improving relationships North, South, east and west, particularly relationships between the two traditions on this island. From a slow start, the shared island initiative has become a movement and it is time the Seanad got behind it more fully. At a forum in Dublin Castle at the weekend, the Taoiseach outlined the further €50 million that will be spent in the near future, on top of the €140 million that has already been spent on a number of projects. It was announced that €10 million will be provided for a cross-Border peatland restoration programme led by the National Parks and Wildlife Service, that €7 million will be provided to tourism agencies to progress a collaboration between the Wild Atlantic Way and the Causeway Coastal Route and that €12 million will be set aside for development of a new innovation hub in the north west. There are a load more projects that Members can read about themselves; they are easy to access.

This is a practical way of trying to unite people on this island. The shared island initiative threatens nobody and it is not, as has been suggested, a Trojan horse towards luring unionists into a united Ireland by stealth. It is anything other than that and unionists appreciate that. We are having an awful lot of conversations about constitutional change and a united Ireland.

The Irish Times has published a definitive poll. To be honest, any reasonable person can see there will not be major constitutional change on this island for the coming decades, and certainly not in my lifetime. I regret to say that but it is a fact. All of us, including me, aspire to a united Ireland that unites people in friendship, understanding and partnership. No other kind of united Ireland is of interest to me or to the vast majority of people. It is time for the Opposition in particular to get behind the shared island initiative. They are behind other talking groups that are having conversations left, right and centre, while spending what appears to be a shocking amount of money. In reality, it is time to get behind something that is practical. We are putting our money where are mouths are for the first time in years. The incoming Taoiseach will take on this project and give it the same full support that the current Taoiseach, Deputy Micheál Martin, has given it. He deserves full credit as the man who has initiated a new way of looking at the problem for the first time in a long time. We are sick of the old rhetoric and methods. We are sick of green versus orange and the tribalism and sectarianism involved. We are sick of it. We want peace and harmony on our island. Let us make a start.