Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

My question relates to local government services and the maintenance of a fully functioning retained fire service. The case I want to talk about concerns a retained firefighter with 12 years' service, based in Dundalk, who has been working for the Revenue service. He has been told that from Monday, he can no longer engage in his life-saving work as a firefighter. Back in September 2017, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform facilitated a local arrangement that allowed firefighters to continue working for Revenue. While this individual was on call, he always made up his hours, worked both of his jobs perfectly and never let either side down. We cannot expect private employers to facilitate a necessary life-saving service like this when we have a public employer failing to facilitate it. We are talking about a firefighter who, with his colleagues, has dealt with some of the major fires in the Cooley Peninsula and some of the very serious arson attacks in Dundalk.

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