I would also like to be associated with the expression of sympathy to the late Brendan Daly. He was a very good Member of this House, very active in all aspects of Irish life and always brought those issues to the fore here in this Chamber as well as in the other Chamber.

I ask the Deputy Leader that we might have a debate in the next term with the Minister, Deputy Ryan, on power generation, grid connection, and all that goes with it. We have solar generation, wind generation, district heat systems, and battery roll-out throughout the country for charging cars. This is quite a large area and it will affect the vast majority of the people of the country. This is running on at a very fast pace and a debate on this in the next term would be very much welcomed by everybody here and by the people at large.

I join in tributes to the late Brendan Daly. I never met Mr. Daly but I am aware of his role and of his service to the people of Clare and to the country. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dílis.

My good friends in Inland Fisheries Ireland are before the Committee of Public Accounts today and I was watching them all morning. They have an awful tale of woe, upset and having been downtrodden, with people victimising them, and Lord save us, I feel so sorry for them. I wish I could attend myself but, unfortunately, we cannot just go in and attend the Committee of Public Accounts and I know the committee members are dealing with the organisation as best they can. I found it ironic to hear the CEO saying he had a good working relationship with the former board members. Five of them resigned-----

Hear, hear.

-----but he had a good working relationship with them. I am not sure what it was. Everything is wrong except the executive, which is doing a tremendous job according to himself. There are no issues. He apologised for a number of issues which are on the public record there. I welcome any apologies but I just find the stuff I am hearing today from officials, both within Inland Fisheries Ireland and the Department, extraordinary.

There are a series of issues. We know all that is going on in RTÉ, and Inland Fisheries Ireland is a much smaller organisation. It has a tale and catalogue of issues that are under investigation. Its members then attend the Committee of Public Accounts with a tale of woe where they claim they are being set upon and that bad things are being said about them by bad people and, I presume, by me and others. I am beginning to feel sorry for them and perhaps I need to pull back a little bit. There are a number of other things coming up, in any event, in the next number of weeks and perhaps we can resume a forensic analysis of issues within Inland Fisheries Ireland in the autumn if we are all still here.

I suggest Senator Kyne’s sympathies are probably misplaced. The Inland Fisheries Ireland saga has a long way to go but, to be fair to the people who are appearing in front of the Committee of Public Accounts this morning, I do not know anybody who does not bring their best game face when they come to sit in front of that committee. As the Senator has said, I believe there is a long way to go on this issue and we will watch with bated breath.

Senator Burke, coincidentally, probably because he was not in the Chamber at the time when she asked, asked for the same debate as Senator Boylan on power and energy generation and the future of it in Ireland. We will try to arrange that in September and as quickly as we can.

Senator Boyhan asked for an invitation to be extended to An Taoiseach. I am told that there is always an open invitation but that does not really materialise unless we push.

This is a formal request.

Yes, I will certainly do that but, more importantly, we will arrange the debate on Seanad reform to try to coincide or to happen before An Taoiseach comes to us in September. I will certainly play my part in trying to get him here as quickly as we can.

Senator Gavan spoke this morning about the section 38 and 39 workers. We hear a great number of platitudes with regard to people’s intentions in respect of the workers in this industry and all of the reasons they are precluded from actually having salaries set for them. To my mind, if enough core funding is given to these organisations, then the institutions themselves, which we all greatly value because we would not be able to run the country without them, would then be able to extend the staff conditions and wages we would expect to see in the public sector. I will certainly organise that debate in September and as quickly as we can.

Senator Craughwell looked for a debate on the oversight role of the Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform, particularly in light of the search and rescue contract and the HSE announcements this morning, which are somewhat staggering. I do not know how many hours there are in a week that you can earn upwards of €1 million being a doctor, but as the Senator said, it is obviously a very much-needed profession. We will ask for a debate in the autumn on the oversight function of Department of Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform with regard to RTÉ, in particular, and what has transpired over the past couple of weeks.

Senator Murphy again paid tribute to Aoife O’Rourke and the wonderful achievement of her gold medal, and we wish her continued success.

I encourage people to pay for their TV licence because it is all of the people and the workers in RTÉ, who are upset, outraged, and all of the expressions they have used in the past number of weeks, who would be impacted if we do not pay our licences. We must support public broadcasting.

Senator Maria Byrne welcomed the inclusion of Limerick in the defective blocks scheme. It is good to finally see it up and running in counties Donegal and Clare but it is great to see Limerick included as well. Other pockets around the country have not yet been included but they have exactly the same symptoms albeit at a much smaller scale and we need to make sure we look after those people as well.

Senators Wall and Keogan spoke about the viability of our childcare providers. In my submission to the Minister regarding what we would all like to see in the budget in September, I said I would really like to see a capital programme - a community crèche funding model - to build crèches around our country. Equally as important as reducing the cost of childcare for all the parents who need it is making sure crèche providers have a viable business because it is a business and they are not going to continue if they cannot at least make money. In many cases, they cannot even pay their own wages. We also need to make sure that workers in that sector are provided for with decent pay and conditions. All those issues can be addressed in the budget so I welcome the contribution of both Senators this morning.

As well as seeking a debate on energy, as she has done on a number of occasions, Senator Boylan encouraged Ireland to withdraw from the Energy Charter Treaty.

Senator Seery Kearney spoke about the fact that it is the first anniversary of the publication of the report of the Joint Committee on International Surrogacy and we still seem to be a long way away from providing the legislation and legal status of those parents and, therefore, I thank her for that.

Senators Kyne, Conway and Dooley opened our proceedings with what I can only say were the most beautiful descriptions of, and tributes to, their colleague. I am very sorry for their loss and the country's loss. The way they described his legacy was beautiful so I thank them. I wish to put on record that Senator McGahon and his beautiful girlfriend, soon to be his wife, are getting married on Sunday so we wish them the very best of luck and a long and happy life together.