Results 31,221-31,240 of 50,917 for speaker:Micheál Martin

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: It also strongly criticises the issue of ambulance capacity being lost due to the delay in handing over to accident and emergency departments. It is not just a question of saying that it is far from perfect. There are serious issues which are crying out to be addressed-----

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: -----in terms of the reconfiguration and the move to centralisation. Would the Taoiseach accept that something has gone wrong concerning people's access to ambulances and the response times.

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: But it is the public sector that should have them.

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: Last week, there was a special "Prime Time" programme on the ambulance service. It monitored various counties and also looked at ambulance response times in Dublin. The programme was shocking as it showed interviews of staff and family members who made 999 calls, some of whom received appalling responses. For example, one man explained how he rang 999 as his father had chest pain. Even...

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: Worryingly, it also found that staffing in some control centres fell below the required safe levels. Does the Taoiseach accept that ambulance response times are far from acceptable? What does he intend to do to address this situation? Does he accept that it is time for a fundamental review of how the ambulance system in the country is organised to ensure proper and effective ambulance...

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: The Taoiseach needs to stop referring to things happening "for the first time" because that is the classical political response to very serious issues. The HIQA report was quite clear that over a ten-year period, there was very significant progress in the training of emergency medical technicians. The whole pre-ambulance care council and so forth which was established more than ten years...

Leaders' Questions (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: -----that up to 47 vehicles were way beyond the seven years and 500,000 km criteria for emergency ambulances in the State. They had long passed those criteria and still had not been replaced and will not be until next year. We welcome that fact, but it is too late and shows a lack of proactivity. The report, which backs up the "Prime Time" programme, says that EMPs are not being adequately...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: -----and brief comments but has been the least accessible Taoiseach of modern times when it comes to detailed interviews or debates.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: He simply will not participate in them. He retreats behind over-written political attacks and empty claims instead of directly engaging with opponents or the people he is here to serve. Tá easpa físe i gcroílár an Rialtais seo agus ó thaobh na Gaeilge de, is léir nach bhfuil an Rialtas i ndáiríre. Sin é an fáth a d'éirigh an...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: Earlier the Taoiseach attacked people who opposed the plan. No one opposed the plan more persistently and consistently than the Taoiseach himself, the previous Tánaiste and the current Tánaiste. They voted against large measures of the plan for which they subsequently claimed credit. However, Fine Gael and the Labour Party did begin one decisive shift in policy. They have made...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: From day one, the Government has put politics before substance. It has seen every problem in terms of how to spin it. After an enormous defeat in May’s local elections, after rising discontent on the doorsteps and in the streets, and after a forced reshuffle, following an uprising in the Labour Party and disquiet in Fine Gael, the Government still does not get it. It still does not...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: It is true that fiscal consolidation has been important and unavoidable. Those parties which like to pretend that all hard decisions could have been avoided are as dishonest as those who pretend that they have had no impact. In his claims about bringing the budget under control the Taoiseach, of course, again refused to acknowledge that two thirds of the required measures were brought into...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: Unsurprisingly, the Taoiseach has found no room to acknowledge how European policies negotiated by others and automatically extended to Ireland gave him billions towards achieving targets. Today our economy is undeniably stronger than it was, and equally undeniable is the fact that the core reason for this has nothing to do with the Government.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: Deputy Reilly was removed from the health portfolio because of his miserable failures in the Department. That is why the Taoiseach did that to him.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: With the greatest of respect, he is the last person in Cabinet who should open his mouth today because he is the personification of why people have lost confidence in the Government.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: It is the skills and hard work of the people that have helped our economy, not the short-term, damaging and divisive policies of the Government. These skills were built up over decades, and the areas of the economy which have grown are ones which were present and growing before 2011, particularly foreign direct investment. This week there will once again be major demonstrations over the...

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: The Minister, Deputy Coveney, knows all about it because he conceived it.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: The usage-based charge was defended by the party from the very start in the NewERA document. We have ended up with a situation where a charge is being imposed to fund meters which are pointless, to maintain a bureaucracy which no one wants and to justify an accounting gimmick which may not work. The Government has no one to blame for this fiasco but itself.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: This was a defining issue in May, whether the Government likes it or not. The Taoiseach said he understood the message loud and clear. The Cabinet spent four months preparing a final answer, which lasted four weeks. Why can the Government not just bow to the inevitable and end this issue? Irish Water should be abolished and this charge should be suspended immediately.

Confidence in Taoiseach and Government: Motion (9 Dec 2014)

Micheál Martin: If things keep going as they are, we will end up with a huge hole in the national budget and people will be paying for declining investment in water services.