Results 3,161-3,180 of 4,608 for speaker:Joe O'Toole

Seanad: Order of Business (30 Oct 2008)

Joe O'Toole: How can Senator Boyle be for it but vote against it? Can he explain that?

Seanad: Mental Health Bill 2008: Second Stage (30 Oct 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I welcome the Minister to the House. While I appreciate the need for this legislation, I am seriously uneasy about certain aspects of it. Unfortunately, I was unable to listen to the debate in the other House and I apologise if the Minister has dealt with some of the issues I am about to raise. I expressed concern about section 16 of the Mental Health Act 2001 in terms of the requirement to...

Seanad: Mental Health Bill 2008: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Oct 2008)

Joe O'Toole: This is the same point I asked about before but I am still not clear on it. The constitutional position is that the law protects habeas corpus. The law required the consultant to exercise discretion. This section states "An unexpired renewal order shall be deemed to be valid and always to have been valid". We are saying effectively that if the fail-safe which the law was required to put...

Seanad: Mental Health Bill 2008: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Oct 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I see the point about section 28 overriding it.

Seanad: Mental Health Bill 2008: Committee and Remaining Stages (30 Oct 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I thank the Minister for explaining the Bill and taking the trouble to go through it. Unfortunately, my group was not invited to the briefing today. While it would have been helpful had we been so invited, this simply was an oversight. As the Minister sets out on her way home, I should mention that one of the Booker prize nominations this year was Sebastian Barry's novel, The Secret...

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I also ask the Deputy Leader to examine the issues surrounding human rights organisations. It is something I intend to raise again when I have had a chance to study the cutbacks that have been implemented in that area. I ask that the Government do something sensible and creative with the budget. There are measures within the budget which could be put to better purpose, a classic example of...

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: The only people with a different view on the matter are those in the Department of Education and Science. There has been an attempt to use world surveys claiming to show North Korea has a better system of education, and that we might have the same if we increased our pupil-teacher ratio, however, such surveys have nothing to do with Ireland. This is a nonsense and we should have a debate on...

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: Hear, hear.

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: On-line voting.

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: How can that be done when one of them will be in Roscrea and one will be in Dublin?

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: They are in the regions.

Seanad: Order of Business (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: Yes, but they are also regional airports.

Seanad: Broadcasting Standards: Statements (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I am delighted to have the opportunity to say a few words on this matter. I welcome the Minister of State to the House. Having listened to the debate it seems it is difficult to get the balance right. I do not pretend to know the answers concerning broadcasting standards. There are certain types of programmes on the air of which I do not approve, but which I could not possibly ban. For...

Seanad: Broadcasting Standards: Statements (4 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: That is my view and there is no place for it in society. I suggest not so much that such programming should be banned, but that it should be singled out as something which the community does not accept and that we should not make jokes about the weakest members of society or some disability with which such people are born or must cope. When it comes to the portrayal of sex and sexuality on...

Seanad: Order of Business (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: In joining with the congratulations to the American President-elect, we should also consider in general terms how his election affects Ireland. The House will be aware that during the course of the campaign Senator Obama made very worrying comments about how he would deal with foreign-based American industry. If he brings to fruition his proposal to stop the repatriation of profits and...

Seanad: Medical Cards: Statements (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: Well done.

Seanad: Medical Cards: Statements (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: He is a man I might acknowledge is related to me and, I might acknowledge to the Fine Gael people, although he might be slow to admit it, a man whose people came from a house in south Connemara that is a very strong Fine Gael house before he moved up to the next county. I welcome him and it is great to see him looking so well. With the permission of the House I wish to share my time with...

Seanad: Nursing Home Standards: Statements (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Hoctor, to the House. She has had a difficult couple of weeks but if the job was easy, they would not get good people to do it.

Seanad: Nursing Home Standards: Statements (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: The debate concerns an issue I have raised time and again in the past couple of years following the Leas Cross issue. I take on board many of the points made by Senator Fitzgerald in her contribution and I want to hear the Minister of State's response. I have had reservations from the beginning, which I have raised repeatedly, about setting up a new group of inspectors to check nursing...

Seanad: Development of Green Technology: Motion (5 Nov 2008)

Joe O'Toole: I welcome the Minister to the House. In his opening statement the proposer of the motion made reference to the lack of representation of some of the groups. He might look at the Government benches, which are not exactly full in terms of its Members taking an interest in this issue. There is a convention that we do not make references to absent Members but, in the interest of balance, I am...