Results 3,861-3,880 of 4,928 for speaker:Peter Mathews

Social Welfare Bill 2014: Report Stage (Resumed) and Final Stage (10 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Hear, hear.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: It is a week short of a year from when the primary legislation was forced through the House, effectively without any debate. Instead we have had this debate yesterday and today and perhaps we will have it tomorrow. This is a good debate but it should have happened a year ago. Various analyses and considerations are being discussed, as is the genesis of Irish Water and whether there should...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: On 28 November 2010 we had the arrival of the troika, indicating where it wanted us to make those fiscal adjustments. One of the items that came up was the proposal to introduce a comprehensive overarching water utility, incorporating water charges. We should have told it to get lost and that we were going to deal with priorities first and add up correctly the bill for what had taken place...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Section 3 is the undoing of what was done a year ago, bar one week, with no debate and with the Whip used. It is very timely and coincidental that the Government Chief Whip is in the Chamber. If this debate had taken place back then, there might have been the realisation that we were on the wrong path. The Government is trying to impose on the people this toxicity while sugar sweetening...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: I encourage the Chief Whip to read the transcript of what she said. The logic is perfect. The evidence and the facts supporting it are absolutely spot on. The Government is trying to fit something that does not fit the situation and it is wrong. The Government is launching a Titanic and they are all on board politically. They will be gone. It is tragic. They should stop it. There is...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: I am trying to show, like a doctor would show to a patient, that it is behaving in a way that is not going to help it get well again. The Government is behaving schizophrenically. It is not getting its facts, its situation properly measured, its accountability properly aligned and working logically from there. It could do it. However, it has got to stop what it is doing if it is about to...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: The Government proposed revenues of €90 million for the first year. That is 0.1 of 1% of the profits of the multinational corporations. Why does it not ask them rather than saying it has got to get €90 million in the year. That is the thin end of what is going to be an ever-expanding wedge, as other Deputies have explained. The only Government Deputies present are those who...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: The Deputy is going to give us all kinds of forensic, minutiae stuff that is irrelevant.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: The discussion that has taken place from the Opposition side, during the debate on the amendments and so on, has been of a quality that any six year school boy or girl listening in would say that the Government should disappear on the basis of the facts, the arguments and the logic it has produced. What the Government has put forward as a proposal is stupid, in capital letters, so stupid it...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: The Government created it.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Some €10 billion.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Following that last interaction between the Ceann Comhairle and the Deputy, and in response to the Minister’s response, I am forming the impression that this whole debate is meaningless because Government Deputies will come in here under the Whip and vote the Bill through without knowing what they are doing.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: That is fundamental.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: I know that. I said earlier that the Minister should stop where he is and reassess, remeasure. That is what everybody does. Carpenters and plumbers do it and so do accountants. The Minister does not know what he is doing. It is a black hole. It is irresponsible to continue if he does not know where he is going.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Bingo.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Yes, thank you professor.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Not buildings.

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: The suggestion that we adjourn is excellent. Deputy Michael Fitzmaurice, who is new to the House, put it very graciously when he said there is nothing wrong about not knowing something and having to revisit it and recalculate. That is the right thing to do. In that gracious sense, it is an opportunity to reconsider the whole issue and get the figures right. Simply put, 2 million is the...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: Let us put a little bit of context into where we are tonight. It is only days ago since the Government had to revisit the water charges scheme. Following the announcements, the EU officials from the troika who were here reviewing issues tried to start pushing us around again. I appreciate that the three gentlemen occupying the ministerial benches are not in an easy position. It is an...

Water Services Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed) (11 Dec 2014)

Peter Mathews: They are households.