Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I would like to have more time, but, unfortunately, the Government does not like dissent or to hear about the reality. The Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, stated social protection had high priority in the Bill. I wonder how that fits in with a quote from one of the organisations affected by the budget which stated the Minister was "breaking the backs of those who need a break". How does that fit in with giving social protection high priority?

The Minister has confirmed that she will cut the respite care grant. I understand Fine Gael is pushing her around. However, even in the area of economics, this does not add up. I know Fine Gael does not care about people; it only cares about money; therefore, I will try to appeal to it. This measure will cost us money. A woman outside Leinster House involved in the protest last week told me that she was on the edge and that removal of part of this grant might push her over the edge. If she went over it - believe me, she looked as if she was on the edge because her voice was trembling - she told me it would cost the State €300,000 to take care of her two children and it would not do as good a job as she did.

Perhaps the Minister does not believe what I am saying. I will tell her a story about someone else because I know she does not have any respect for me:

I have just spent this evening between helping my ten year old learn his lines for his Christmas play and trying to decide which of the medications I am prescribed by my consultant neurologist I really need. The levy on each item is now €1.50 as opposed to 50 cents.

This person continues:

Eight items are without doubt a necessity I cannot live without. So I set about trawling through the other meds to see what can be axed. So an MS patient with severe kidney impairment and kidney disease, I was thinking I can't cut out my antibiotics. I may, in fact, get septicemia, not nice. I better keep them because they are prolonging my life.


Pain relief. I have many levels of pain and all need to be controlled. I am not going to try to describe it. The choice I am left with [the Minister should remember that she had choices and this is the choice with which she left this woman] I may in fact, as my budget may not allow me to sustain the money it requires to keep my pain at bay, have to do without.

At the top of the first page of the Minister's speech it states "Check against delivery". I suggest that she check it against reality and against the promises she and her party made.

I am not appealing to Fine Gael because its members do not give a damn. I am appealing to the socialists in respect of the promises they made before the general election. We know that the Labour thinking on those promises runs to the effect "Is that not what one does during a campaign?" The answer in that regard is "No, it is not". That is sick and I hope the Minister is proud of herself.

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