Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The question many people around the country are asking currently is who is running the country. Is it the Taoiseach's Government or the permanent government? We know the Secretary General of the Department of Health, Robert Watt, is in a rarefied position, not least because his pay grade is above the Taoiseach's. Does that mean he can snub or thumb his nose at attending Oireachtas committees and decline to be held accountable for decisions he takes? The same Secretary General thinks so little of the Oireachtas finance committee that he did not even bother responding to its request for a meeting tomorrow to discuss the botched appointment of Tony Holohan to a position in Trinity College Dublin.

There was a significant €20 million sum associated with this proposed secondment and the finance committee is tasked with investigating State spending so why will the Secretary General and the Minister for Health not appear before that committee? How on Earth does the Taoiseach expect Dáil committees to have any authority in their functions and, for example, convince people in semi-State sectors or the private sector to appear before them if civil servants on very high salaries refuse to do so? Who exactly is calling the shots? It is certainly not the Ministers.

We learned in yesterday's Irish Examinerthat the Taoiseach's colleague, the Minister of State at the Department of Health with responsibility for disabilities, Deputy Anne Rabbitte, cannot even get a meeting with HSE managers in individual community CHO areas around the country. When the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, requested those meetings from the managers of the nine different CHO areas, she was told it was not "operationally feasible". She was contacted not just by individual managers but by the national director of community operations, who essentially told the Minister of State to get back in her box. We know disability services are in crisis and the High Court has ruled very recently that the HSE's current treatment of assessment of needs for children is illegal. The Minister of State cannot get a 40-minute meeting once a month with HSE managers.

Do Ministers in the Government have authority over the Departments they oversee? To her credit, the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, was trying to get answers and to the root of what is causing the rot in the disability sector. We know different CHO areas perform differently and there is a variety of reasons for that. Some perform way better than others so it is perfectly legitimate for the Minister of State to seek those individual meetings.

Who is running the country? Is it the Government or the permanent government? Is the Taoiseach happy that senior civil servants are snubbing invitations to Oireachtas committees? What will the Taoiseach do about civil servants refusing to meet his Ministers? Do elections and democracy matter? Who is running this country? What is happening is really frustrating many people.

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