Results 461-480 of 11,255 for speaker:Colm Burke

Seanad: Order of Business (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I am surprised by the comments that foreign aid is a sham. In fairness to the Government, there is a mechanism of checking and cross checking all moneys allocated by the Department or the EU. Mistakes are made and sometimes things are not done in the way they are supposed to be done. As an MEP, I employed people in Brussels as research assistants, one of whom subsequently got a job...

Seanad: Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012: Committee Stage (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I thank the Minister for coming to the House to deal with this matter. I note the comments made by Senator Barrett about the amendments. Regarding amendment No. 4 he is talking about the Central Bank having a role. I would have no objection to that but it is not appropriate in this case. It is something that should be examined in the long term. I had my own difficulties with VHI in the...

Seanad: Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: Senator David Cullinane's comments deserve a response from this side of the House. There is an impression that the private health care sector is not providing a service. There are over 2 million appointments per annum in the private health care sector outside hospitals. Is the Senator suggesting this should be abolished and adopted into the public hospital system? I do not believe the...

Seanad: Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: There are people providing comprehensive services in the health care and insurance sectors who are very dedicated to their jobs. We need to be careful when we criticise those working in the health care sector, that it is at least constructive. I am concerned about how we are dealing with consultants. I know of seven consultants who have resigned in the past six months, two of them in...

Seanad: Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I do not know.

Seanad: Health Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: The Senator says people are only in the health system to make large sums of money. That is not true. There are very dedicated and committed individuals who are providing health care and many of them are doing much more than what their contracts require. We need to be conscious of this in any debate on the health service. We also need to be careful how we proceed on the issue of junior...

Seanad: Adjournment Matters: Care of the Elderly (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: Nursing Homes Ireland, several other organisations representing the elderly and health agencies are anxious to facilitate a longer-term planning strategy to be developed for caring for the elderly. There are also concerns about the availability of step-down facilities from hospital and comprehensive home care packages for the elderly. While the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA,...

Seanad: Adjournment Matters: Care of the Elderly (19 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I thank the Minister of State for her comprehensive reply. I acknowledge the excellent work she and her Department are doing on this complex issue. The nursing homes organisations are aware of the Department's consultations with the various groups but believe more could be achieved if the groups met together with the Department as opposed to individually. Even if such meetings were only...

Seanad: Order of Business (20 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I join my colleagues in wishing everyone a happy Christmas but we should also thank the people who work behind the scenes in the Bills Office, making sure that the documentation we receive is in order. I thank them for all their work over the past 12 months. I do not agree with Senator Coghlan about the public interest directors. I served on a State board for ten years as a nominee of Cork...

Seanad: Order of Business (20 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I am addressing this from a legal point of view. People appointed to serve and look after the public interest play an important role and should be there. We may not agree with their decisions or how they arrive at them but they do serve a useful purpose. In the past few weeks some people came to me who had a loan of ¤5,000 on which the bank took a write-down of ¤2,500. Their...

Seanad: Order of Business (20 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I brought up the issue raised earlier by Senator Bradford at this morning's health committee meeting. The proposal for the meetings between 8 January and 10 January is to allow groups to make a presentation on the issues that have to be dealt with and for Members to get clarification on them. This will allow us to draft the legislation in a careful way. It will be a useful exercise.

Seanad: Order of Business (20 Dec 2012)

Colm Burke: I object to that claim. It is outrageous.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: I thank Professor Murphy and Ms Spillane for the very comprehensive and concise submission. With regard to the issue of the expert group giving a number of different options for dealing with the issue of suicide, including an assessment by two psychiatrists and an obstetrician, given their experience in the Medical Council, what is the witnesses' view of the three options proposed and what...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: Options were set out in the expert group report and Professor Murphy referred to paragraph 6.4 of that report. I know he does not want to come down on one side or the other on these options. Does Professor Murphy believe that all three options are workable?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: I thank the guests. I refer to the expert group report which gives a number of different options as to the number of specialists, such as whether there should be two specialists and an obstetrician or one specialist and an obstetrician. What would be the most workable solution from among those proposals? My second question is about a person who is suicidal. One of the consultants this...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: I have a question for the Institute of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists on the options set out in the expert group report. I asked this question this morning and I seek clarification. Three options are given with regard to the decisions to be made by psychiatrists. These are: that the decision would be made by two psychiatrists or two specialists; that the decision would be made by a...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: To clarify, Professor McAuliffe said two obstetricians should decide in the case of suicide. Is that correct?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: Does she mean two obstetricians and one psychiatrist?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (8 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: The expert group report gives three options which does not include that one. Is the institute going outside the expert group report's recommendation?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Implementation of Government Decision Following Expert Group Report into Matters Relating to A, B and C v. Ireland (9 Jan 2013)

Colm Burke: With regard to the Bar Council-----