Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

The chair of the St. Vincent's Hospital Group, Mr. James Menton, told the Joint Committee on Health yesterday that the St. Vincent's Hospital Group is a secular organisation. This is the St. Vincent's Hospital Group still has St. Vincent in its name. Does it not still have religious statues and icons in its grounds and in its hospital? At the same time as that contribution was being made, a quick check on the Sisters of Charity website yielded the following statement: "health care is provided in an atmosphere of Christian love and compassion, operating according to the values of the Sisters of Charity." Is this a lay Catholic successor organisation or a secular organisation? The answer to that is pretty clear.

Fianna Fáil might have calculated the odds here, cynically, and figured that its voter base tends to be older and more conservative and the party will not lose much ground as a result of this decision. There is no Fine Gael Deputy in the House at the moment that I can see but I think that party's voter base might be a little bit different. Abraham Lincoln once said-----

See this speech in context