Results 1,081-1,100 of 1,253 for speaker:John Crown

Seanad: Public Health (Standardised Packaging of Tobacco) Bill 2014: [Seanad Bill amended by the Dáil] Report and Final Stages (3 Mar 2015)

John Crown: -----because the smuggled product is cheap and it is a cheaper way to hook children on cigarettes. They will do anything to make cheaper product available. When we see the internecine webs of convoluted and highly implausible sales routes that have been plotted by the major companies through tiny countries, where cigarettes are being imported in such numbers that it would suggest every...

Seanad: Public Health (Standardised Packaging of Tobacco) Bill 2014: [Seanad Bill amended by the Dáil] Report and Final Stages (3 Mar 2015)

John Crown: We want them either to have the smarts and intelligence to take up an alternative line of business or to go out of business. If they are going to insist on working in businesses which have as their business plan the simple four words "addict children to carcinogens" we want them to fail. In no sense are they partners of ours. The Minister has been a noble exception but other members of the...

Seanad: Public Health (Standardised Packaging of Tobacco) Bill 2014: [Seanad Bill amended by the Dáil] Report and Final Stages (3 Mar 2015)

John Crown: That is very simple. My own sense is that the Government and its agencies should not have anything to do with public relations companies. Every public representative should be made to stand or fall on his or her own reputation. Every public or civil servant, above a certain grade, should be put on a rotation where once a month, or once every two months, they are the ones who answer...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I welcome our guests. This is an important discussion. It is complex and it is important to dig down into some of the specifics. I speak with a little familiarity with this area, having founded the All Ireland Cooperative Oncology Research Group, ICORG, many years ago. Most of my research has in fact involved drug development, and that is what I have been primarily interested in. I am...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: Is it correct to say that IPHA primarily represents Irish affiliates and is not the professional representative body for major international manufacturers?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: There is some confusion about that. Without meaning any disrespect, it is important to be clear that we are not talking to the people who represent the manufacturers in Ringaskiddy and so on but to representatives of Irish affiliates, which are mainly about sales.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: These are very important hearings and I thank the participants. I raised an issue in the earlier session in regard to the possibility that companies had been lobbying our Government, alleging that domestic purchasing policies for the tiny, infinitesimally small by international standards, Irish market in some way influences the siting of manufacturing plants in Ireland. I said I believed...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: If may ask your indulgence, I had to step away for an emergency. Would it be inappropriate to ask if my other questions in this regard-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: We staged a coup in the Chairman's absence.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I presume generic products manufactured in Ireland are overwhelmingly for export. Can Mr. Gallagher give us a back-of-an-envelope figure for the value of generics exports? We have heard the figure of €40 billion to €50 billion for pharmaceutical exports.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (5 Mar 2015)

John Crown: Thank you.

Seanad: Order of Business (10 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I wish to comment on reports over the weekend about wide disparities in survival from cardiac events or heart attacks in hospitals across the country. This had a particular resonance for me because in the early years of this particular Seanad, similar specific allegations were made about Roscommon hospital and at the time, it appeared as though those allegations were being used in defence of...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: General Scheme of Public Health (Alcohol) Bill 2015: Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (10 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I welcome my friends and colleagues from my old medical school and congratulate my former classmate, Professor Murray, on the appropriate public stance he has taken on this critically important health issue. Most of us make our own deals with the devil when it comes to alcohol. People who understand what alcohol is all about have made decisions about certain compromises they make in return...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: Cost of Prescription Drugs: Discussion (Resumed) (12 Mar 2015)

John Crown: Before I start, I note that I would like to meet Deputy Ó Caoláin after the meeting to give him my prescription for Atorvastatin. If one of his constituents could pick some up for me, I would be very grateful. One of the underlying realities of pharmaco-economics is that we are working in an increasingly globalised world. We hope that as more harmonisation of drug purchasing...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: General Scheme of Public Health (Alcohol) Bill 2015: (Resumed) Alcohol Research Group (12 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I welcome the witnesses. In my day job I do a bit of biomedical research, and it is very nice to hear a really professional and top-quality research-based presentation in these halls. I have a couple of quick questions. I may have missed the witnesses mentioning the average price of a unit of alcohol purchased in Ireland now. Do we have some idea of the quartiles and what percentage of...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: General Scheme of Public Health (Alcohol) Bill 2015: (Resumed) Alcohol Research Group (12 Mar 2015)

John Crown: What is Mr. Angus's guesstimate? What is the median cost of the unit?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children: General Scheme of Public Health (Alcohol) Bill 2015: (Resumed) Alcohol Research Group (12 Mar 2015)

John Crown: Having heard this compelling evidence, I believe some or all of the increase in revenue which is generated for someone by unit pricing should be taken into the public Exchequer and used for research. I also believe that we will have in Ireland a near unique opportunity to do original research but also to confirm the Canadian research if we do this. We should set about doing this...

Seanad: Children and Family Relationships Bill 2015: Second Stage (24 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I express my gratitude to the Minister, her officials and her predecessor for tackling this extremely complex issue. This has been a Herculean task. Without trivialising it, in attempting to read the Bill and its explanatory memorandum, I was reminded of the famous remark made by Groucho Marx when he thanked someone for giving him a book explaining Ulysses. He said he now needed somebody...

Seanad: An Bille um an gCeathrú Leasú is Tríocha ar an mBunreacht (Comhionannas Pósta) 2015: An Dara Céim - Thirty-fourth Amendment of the Constitution (Marriage Equality) Bill 2015: Second Stage (25 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I thank the Minister for her commitment to meaningful and important social reform legislation and to this amendment. It will enable us to hold our heads high. At the risk of being complacent, I am one of the people who believes the referendum will pass and will pass easily. I do not believe it will be that terribly divisive, as there is a broad national consensus in favour of this equality...

Seanad: Order of Business (26 Mar 2015)

John Crown: I would like clarification from the Deputy Leader on a few issues. They are really the same issue, but they have different ramifications. As Members may remember, I introduced legislation earlier in this term which would have prevented Government agencies suing anybody, presumably including each other, in defence of their good name. My own belief is that in a democracy, where they are...