Jerry Cowley (Mayo, Independent)

This is primarily a health issue. The concept of café bars is not a bad idea. The difficulty is that we already have too many alcohol outlets in this State. We have 13,000 pub licences which is equivalent to one pub for every 260 adults, compared to one pub for every 780 adults in Britain. Yet we think Britain is full of pubs. The addition of more pubs would have sounded the death knell for rural pubs, many of which have closed already.

The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform was quoted in this morning's newspapers as saying that he disagreed with the task force report on alcohol, which details the over-availability of alcohol in Ireland. The Minister rubbished the opinion of the medical experts such as Dr. Joe Barry, a distinguished specialist and lecturer in public health in Trinity College Dublin and who was a member of the task force on alcohol. The Minister now knows more than the medical experts and more than the task force that reported on alcohol. There may be medical degrees available up lamp-posts in Dublin. The top of a lamp-post is like the famous salmon of knowledge touched by Fionn MacCumhail and which imparted to the Minister some extraordinary knowledge to which none of the medical experts are privy. Did something happen up that lamp-post in that rarefied atmosphere?

The Bill, as published, is basically flawed. It needs to be re-examined and some questions need to be asked. Does the Minister support the report of the strategic task force on alcohol? Does the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children support the report? If they do not — their body language suggests they do not — that raises very serious issues. Does the former Chairman of the Joint Committee on Health and Children, Deputy Batt O' Keeffe, support the report? Will the Government deal with the alcohol problem? It is about availability and a plan. Does the Government have a proper plan?

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