Results 30,021-30,040 of 40,897 for speaker:Simon Coveney

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: What the Government has said is that we are taking legal advice regarding the options that are available to us, consistent with the pay agreement that everybody signed up to with their eyes open. There is a responsibility on the Government to deliver on that, and that involves hundreds of millions of euro of extra pay across the public sector. There is also a responsibility on unions and...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: The Minister for Health has made it very clear that he is committed to the second cath lab in Waterford. It is part of the service plan for 2019. The Taoiseach has said very clearly that the funding challenges in relation to the national children's hospital will not result in the cancellation of any commitments that have been made. In the nature of capital expenditure, as others in this...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: Nobody told the Deputies it would be delayed. The Deputy should not mislead the House.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: The Deputy said there would be a delay.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: Nobody is trying to hide anything. I am looking at my speaking note on the national children's hospital, which has not changed in a week, and it talks about the costs of investment in ICT, the roll-out of electronic health recording through new ICT capital programmes, the kind of thing Deputy Cullinane is now supposedly revealing as some new piece of data that we do not have. This is...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: I was not at the meeting. All I can say is that the Government is committed to the second cath lab. Many people in this House and elsewhere have worked hard on that, from the Minister of State, Deputy Halligan, to Senator Coffey, Deputy Cullinane and others.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: They have raised this issue repeatedly. The Government's commitment to it is firm.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: I agree with virtually everything the Deputy said apart from the final line. The Government respects nurses. The Government accepts and understands that no nurse wants to be out on strike when he or she could be at work. There is an understanding that the INMO has not done this likely. The union does not do it often. This is a reflection of the frustration and anxiety in the nursing...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: The Deputy knows that we are not passive observers here because he has been in the Department concerned. The State and management interacted with the Labour Court in a significant way, as did the nursing unions. At the time, the demands and the confines of both arguments did not allow for a basis for an agreed compromise. We hope this can change.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: We are doing something. Plenty of conversations are happening, as I suspect the Deputy will be aware. The Government speaks to ICTU all the time and we listen to it. We also have to operate within the obvious confines of ensuring that we follow through on the commitments that we have made. We must make commitments that are affordable to the State as a whole, that are fair to public...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: I will tell the Deputy what it is not. Our alternative is not what she is proposing, which is to pay everybody what they ask for-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: ----and to bankrupt the country. That is what her kind of politics delivers-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: It is give everybody what they want every week and borrow money to do it, which then results in the kind of dramatic-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: -----and damaging decision-making that is forced on a government that happened to us a decade ago.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: We are not going there again. Instead, we are guaranteeing public sector workers that their pay will continue to increase every year, that we will be able to afford to do it, and that we will work with them on pay, allowances, conditions and so on through the public sector pay agreement, which they signed up to, to provide that kind of certainty and ensure we get incremental improvements...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: We have an obligation to be honest with people. We want to work with nurses. We want to find a solution to this dispute. We want to treat them with respect. We want to use our imagination to try to find a way of doing that within the confines of an agreement to which they and we have signed up. We want to make sure that we can afford to do that so that we do not risk the financial...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: If the Deputy respects nurses she should be honest with them in terms of what is possible. She talks about divide and conquer or people playing tough man. We are doing neither of those things. The Deputy is the person who is trying to divide here and encourage more people to go out on strike. What we are trying to do is solve problems, treat people with respect, listen to them and try to...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: We are dramatically increasing the financial supports for that health sector and we are incrementally increasing salaries and income of nurses and all the other people who work across the health sector. However, we have to do that in a managed way that is controlled and predictable to ensure we do not have the highs and lows of trying to be populist about pay demands in terms of how we respond.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: That is not what this Government will do. We will be honest with the people about what is possible and then sit down and try to work that through with them in a way that recognises that nurses have a tough job to do in very difficult circumstances. We want to work with them through those challenges in a way that is fair but consistent and affordable.

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (31 Jan 2019)

Simon Coveney: I want to clarify for the House that the rainy day fund is not for capital investment in health infrastructure. There is a significant increase in capital investment in health infrastructure but I will ask the Minister to come back in regard to Sligo University Hospital.