Results 11,721-11,740 of 21,058 for speaker:Alan Kelly

Written Answers — Department of Health: Departmental Meetings (3 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: 141. To ask the Minister for Health the correspondence, discussions or meetings he or his predecessors, Ministerial advisers or departmental officials had with clinical pathology laboratories or their subsidiaries; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [19330/18]

Health Service Reform: Motion [Private Members] (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I will be supporting the motion and thank the Members of the Rural Independent Group for tabling it. I will confine my comments to the CervicalCheck issue. It has been said the chief executive of the HSE will not be turning up at the Joint Committee on Health at 9 a.m. I might be breaking some protocol, but, as the Acting Chairman of the Committee on Public Accounts on Thursday, he...

Health Service Reform: Motion [Private Members] (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Absolutely.

Written Answers — Department of An Taoiseach: Departmental Staff (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: 92. To ask the Taoiseach if a civil servant in his Department made contact with members of An Garda Síochána in connection with the events of 23 and 24 June 2017 when a civil servant in his Department was arrested outside Cabra Garda station; and if so, the details of the contact between 23 June 2017 and to date in 2018. [19618/18]

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I know I only have a few minutes but I thank the witnesses for the honesty with which they have approached the committee. I was watching a lot of the proceedings. The meeting has been very helpful. We will have a debate on health tonight, a meeting of the Committee on Health, on which I sit, tomorrow and a meeting of the Committee of Public Accounts, which I will chair and before which Mr....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Absolutely.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I think this is important for the witnesses because an awful lot is being said in the media and so on about what the State Claims Agency does. Effectively, there needs to be a change or an alteration, for want of a better to word, to its statutory remit to allow it more flexibility when it comes to these kinds of cases. Whether Mr. Breen likes it or not, if something does not change and if...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Yes, absolutely.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Even though the State Claims Agency would obviously rather have all this dealt with quickly through mediation, which would be the right scenario, given the circumstances.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Mr. Breen said he listened quite carefully to the Taoiseach and what he said about how we should behave in these cases, and that is obviously the appropriate thing to do. At governmental level, there will have to be legislative changes to facilitate the State Claims Agency to do this. What would those changes be?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Obviously, there would have to be changes fairly quickly.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Does Mr. Breen accept that the State Claims Agency's hands are tied as the agency is currently constituted and that there would have to be significant changes instantaneously for it not to be party to cases involving the remaining six?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I know that.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Within the State Claims Agency's statutory remit and the rules under which it works, it would not be able, through mediation, to settle with these women and sue the laboratories subsequently.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I just wanted to clarify that. I have a few further quick questions. We are all aware of the famous note that was prepared for the Minister, Deputy Harris, from a couple of weeks ago. There has been commentary on this aside from that of the State Claims Agency. Did Mr. Breen feel it necessary to say there were other cases in that note? Would that have been the right thing to do?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Did Mr. Breen not feel, as background information, as an escalation issue, that the fact that there were similarities with other cases meant it would have been appropriate to inform the Department? Did the State Claims Agency do so?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: That is interesting. I was in committee last week with the Department of Health and I was the person who asked the question that revealed that there were not ten cases. I asked the same question of the HSE and the Department of Health. They had two different answers. It was how they categorised them more than anything else. When did the State Claims Agency inform both of those entities...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: Let us presume the following. I met the Department-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: This is a very important point.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: State Claims Agency: Discussion (8 May 2018)

Alan Kelly: I met the Department of Health at 3.30 p.m. last Tuesday. The Minister spoke inside-----