22/06/2022 | 17:43:31 Thank you, Chairman. I want to commend the rapporteurs, the Secretariat, and everybody involved in these reports, and particularly to commend our Ukrainian colleagues. To be a rapporteur at any stage for a PACE report is quite a task. To take it on in such a time of national and personal challenge, we are particularly grateful to you. Mister Chairman, as this debate proceeded, the Irish Times published a story online about a 12-year-old Ukrainian girl who came from Kharkiv with her... 27/04/2022 | 18:26:48 Thank you, Madam President. Madam President, in 1996 the Irish journalist Veronica Guerin was murdered by representatives of drug organisations whose work she was highlighting. This was a major shock to our republic and it is in her wake and as a major tribute to her that the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) was established. The mission of CAB is to deny and deprive people of the proceeds of criminal conduct. It is a multi-agency body made up of police, of civil servants, THE department of social... 27/04/2022 | 16:59:38 Thank you, Mr President. As an Irish person, it is in our DNA to understand what it's like to be threatened by a larger, more militarily powerful neighbour, and to stand up to that threat. And that is why we stand as a people in more ways than one, with the people of Ukraine in their current situation. I want to commend Mr Frank SCHWABE and the Secretariat – because behind every good rapporteur is an excellent secretariat – from the Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy on his report... 26/04/2022 | 10:20:53 Mister President, I too want to commend the rapporteur on his work and his Committee. It is interesting, Mister President, to notice that this report was commissioned on 12 April 2019. In the words of W. B. Yeats, "all has changed, and changed utterly". A worldwide pandemic, that we've not had the opportunity to reflect how that impacted on our people's lived experiences, and that has impacted on our democracy, and now we have the war on Ukraine and the invasion of Ukraine. I think the change... 15/03/2022 | 19:20:04 Madam Rapporteur, thank you for your report, for the extraordinary work you've put into that report. Madam Chair, I welcome the president's clarification that we are proceeding this evening in spite of the Russian announcement that they intend to withdraw from the Council of Europe. They intend to withdraw by using Article 7. They intend to do that to try and stop, to withdraw before we push them, and we must proceed to push them, to expel them. The Council of Ministers must expel them too... 26/01/2022 | 12:12:11 Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the rapporteur for his very good report and for his very passionate remarks. I welcome the recommitment within the report to the European Sport Charter of our Council and in particular the assertion that all human beings have an inalienable right of access to support in a healthy environment. I endorse the rapporteur's views on sports being part of a holistic vision that is much more than one thing, and that governments must consider it as thus also... 26/01/2022 | 11:05:00 Thank you Mr President. Thank you to Lord George FOULKES for his report. Anybody that starts his presentation by quoting Bill Shankly is very welcome to any forum that I participate in. I note from Lord George FOULKES' background that he has taken on corporate might in soccer before and in football before, so I know that this report, which is very welcome, will be followed through. Mr President, Many of the issues we discuss at this forum are very macro. They may not affect people's daily... 25/01/2022 | 17:14:28 Thank you, President. And I want to congratulate you on your election. We say in Gaelic "go n-éirí leat": may you rise and may you have every success for your term. And to thank Mr Rik DAEMS for his presidency during an extraordinary time in PACE's history. The undersecretary spoke of the worldwide effect of the Council of Europe and that it could be used to reduce tension and conflict in Europe. In an earlier response he spoke of the need for dialogue to assist in de-escalating tensions in... 29/09/2021 | 11:36:52 Good morning, Chairman and thank you. And it is a pleasure to follow my colleague, Ms Fiona O'LOUGHLIN and I endorse all that she had said but I also add some words of my own. I welcome Mr George PAPANDREOU's report in relation to citizens' assemblies and yes; we have had a very successful record of those here in Ireland. They have been instrumental in changing our country but they cannot be mistaken for detailed engagement with local communities, with local organisations, with sectors that... 23/06/2021 | 12:23:32 Thank you, Mister President. Just to welcome this debate, but let's not get carried away by the 10th anniversary. We have seen, in the last 12-15 months of this pandemic, a rise in many countries of reports of domestic violence. I would ask the panel, if in the context of that experience they were to update the Convention, an update on the lessons that we have learned from the pandemic, what would they put into the Convention? I would ask the Prime Minister, if he would commit on behalf of...