Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

When Deputy Varadkar was last Taoiseach some four or five years ago, I raised with him the case of Clonmel man. John White is a Tipperary man who was in difficulties in Dubai because of his involvement in a company that he had no control over. He has not been allowed to leave the country at all and to return home, although I had thought that he was home. The Taoiseach said he knew the family in Dublin. He had a stroke on Tuesday last week and is in a critical condition. His family are desperately appealing to the Taoiseach, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Irish Embassy there to do something to try to get this man home, if he is fit to come home at this stage, given he is seriously ill. This has been dragging on for almost ten years now. It is totally unfair that he is incarcerated and, now, given the fact he has suffered this second stroke, his family are desperately anxious. I appeal to the Taoiseach, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Irish Embassy people to intervene in this case on humanitarian grounds to get him repatriated to his family after all those years.

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