Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I recall the question Deputy Collins asked me last week. She asked me if the Minister for Education and Skills would meet representatives of the TEEU and the USI. The Minister was sitting beside me. He told me he had planned to meet the USI and I gave Deputy Collins that answer last week. It is a little unfair for Deputy Collins to twist that into a refusal to meet the TEEU. I do not run the diary of the Minister for Education and Skills. If representatives from the TEEU want to meet the Minister for Education and Skills I imagine they are perfectly capable of arranging a meeting with him.

This Government has a long-standing policy of meeting trade unions, student unions and bodies that represent people who have difficulties and grievances. I do not expect there will be any difficulty in a meeting being arranged with the Minister for Education and Skills. There is no necessity for Deputy Collins to elevate it into some kind of refusal on the part of the Minister for Education and Skills to meet them.

See this speech in context