Results 2,941-2,960 of 7,975 for speaker:Joe Higgins
- Leaders' Questions (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: These so-called labour activation measures are an excuse for the Government's failure to create jobs over the past year.
- Leaders' Questions (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Unfortunately, the relentless loss of jobs in the domestic economy will continue as a result of the Government's policies. In response to a question asked by my colleague, Deputy Daly, the Minister for Social Protection said it is expected that there will be an additional 45,200 net redundancies this year, unfortunately. The Minister added that there will be a further 40,000 redundancies in...
- Leaders' Questions (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: -----are straining at the leash to resume the headlines they last used in the late 1980s about "spongers" and "malingerers" on the dole. It is coming close to the surface. They did not dare to use such headlines over the past three years because it was clear who are the culprits and who are the victims. Perhaps they think such headlines can be used again now. Does the Tánaiste want the...
- Leaders' Questions (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: That is not where the jobs are.
- Order of Business (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: The variation should be agreed by the Government. What is being proposed for the Water Services (Amendment) Bill is a mockery of what one would imagine a legislative process to be. Fine Gael and the Labour Party, the parties currently in power, railed for years against the indiscriminate use of the guillotine by their predecessors. Was it all bluster? Did they mean it or did they not?...
- Written Answers — Hospital Services: Hospital Services (26 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Question 229: To ask the Minister for Health if he will instruct the Health Service Executive to open all the beds in Dingle Hospital, County Kerry, to full capacity with immediate effect in view of the pressure for long-stay places for the elderly in the Dingle Peninsula. [4678/12]
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Is the truth not that the fiscal compact is a treaty for permanent austerity and therefore provides for permanent attacks on the living standards and public services of ordinary Europeans? Is the reality not that the obsession of the Government at the summit was to secure a wording for the austerity treaty that it hoped would avoid a referendum by having the initial German Government demand...
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: They must be delighted with the Taoiseach for blaming the Irish people for the disaster of their system, paying billions to salvage Irish, French, German and other banks on the backs of the Irish people and then agreeing to austerity in perpetuity to pay for all of this. Does the Taoiseach agree with his Minister for Transport, Deputy Varadkar, that Irish people are essentially so stupid they...
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: I would have thought they were beneath the Minister.
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Does the Taoiseach have any inkling that what he agreed last night, namely, permanent austerity and cutbacks, will have a drastic effect on employment and bring about the opposite of job creation? For the first time in a long while, I noticed cynical propaganda emerging from the European Union to the effect that the economic crisis is about to be turned around and there has been some talk of...
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: That was window dressing to get the treaty through.
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: No new funds are available.
- Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: I will give the Taoiseach plenty of constructive suggestions.
- Social Partnership (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Question 4: To ask the Taoiseach the discussions he has had with the social partners since the beginning of the year. [3678/12]
- Social Partnership (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: The Taoiseach does not seem to realise that what he calls the well proven mechanisms of the State are utterly ineffective in protecting workers' rights with regard to some of these - what I was going to call - rogue employers. However, the La Senza lingerie chain was part of a huge multinational corporation that owns Weetabix, which is an internationally known brand. The Taoiseach says...
- Social Partnership (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Following my colleague's question, immediately after Questions to the Taoiseach, the Taoiseach should get one of his senior officials to telephone KPMG and ask the company to send the wages immediately. The workers are in very difficult economic circumstances. This is money that they are owed. There is cynicism in working them overtime during sales and then walking away without notice. I...
- Cabinet Sub-Committees (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: Question 6: To ask the Taoiseach the number of times the Cabinet Sub Committee on Economic Recovery and Jobs has met. [3679/12]
- Cabinet Sub-Committees (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: There is a calculated propaganda campaign here and in Europe to talk up prospects, and say that the worst is over, things have changed and we are now at the beginning of significant growth. Does the Taoiseach not agree it is all propaganda? The reality of the hard cold figures tell a different story. It is no coincidence that the EU summit discussed job creation; it wants to sell an...
- Cabinet Sub-Committees (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: -----pretending it has a great initiative. What new ideas, proposals and funding, if any, will the Taoiseach be bringing news of to the economic recovery and jobs sub-committee after his attendance at the summit? He mentioned job creation, small enterprise support etc., were important items on the agenda. What is the outcome? What are the targets? Does the State have specific targets with...
- Cabinet Sub-Committees (31 Jan 2012)
Joe Higgins: That is not appropriate.