Jerry Buttimer (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----where we can have the type of scrutiny we have with legislation and where we can have a proper engagement. I fully accept this is window-dressing in here. I volunteered to speak on this motion because, as Deputy Healy can tell, I am passionate about the rights and entitlements of people. I will argue the political points with the Deputy but the fundamentals are this is a House of the Oireachtas where we determine how we allocate money. It is our job, as Members of this House, to lobby, to advocate and to go to Ministers, but the point that is being lost by some is that this Government has allocated money to social housing.

I want to go back to the issue of health. Deputy Healy was with me today in the Joint Committee on Health and Children. We are spending €12.2 billion on health. Deputy Healy calls for it to be put into the Constitution. What would it mean, if we go to the hospital groups or to the old health board regions on which we served - Deputy Healy might not have served with me on the HSE south health committee - and if we were to put it in the Constitution that we must spend X? How would we prescribe where it would be spent in the context of health? Let us look at the issue of obesity. The biggest health issue we face in the country, which we have tackled to a point, is tobacco where we banned all but plain packaging. Obesity and its related issues will have a profound impact on us as a society because we are living longer, we are more sedentary and our diet is appalling. I would like to hear this teased out a little. How, by putting this into the Constitution, would we-----

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