Results 1-18 of 18 for 5 million segment:7061972

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Pat Buckley: ...unit was set up to communicate with the electorate. Instead it has turned out to be a Fine Gael propaganda unit. We should call it the "huff and puff and do nothing" unit at a cost of €5 million to the taxpayer. This certainly was a mistake. They say that a bad law is an unjust law. The strategic communications unit, SCU, is unjust. The €5 million cost of the SCU could...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Imelda Munster: ...not supposed to be the news. Initially we were told the unit would not cost the State a cent. Those were the Taoiseach's words. Subsequently, we discovered that it would cost in the region of €5 million annually. For that €5 million taxpayers have witnessed a series of blunders. Chief among those blunders was the Project Ireland 2040 launch where the communications unit...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Marc MacSharry: That cost taxpayers' money. There is no level of morality associated with the "Leo the Vain" unit. This is €5 million of taxpayers' money. I will not even begin to list off the umpteen things Deputy Tony McLoughlin would like to do in Sligo with €5 million. Deputy Martin Kenny and I also have our list of things to do, as do all Deputies in the House. Deputy Micheál...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Michael Collins: ...motion which I will support. From the day the so-called strategic communications unit was announced, I have called for its abolition. The sheer arrogance of the Government to treat itself to a €5 million strategic communications unit on budget day last October was appalling. The same budget failed to make any real change in dealing with the ongoing housing and homelessness...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Brian Stanley: ..., contradiction or concealment. They must be about clarity and facts. Leo's good news department was not created for clarity and truth but for confusion. We now have this unit at a cost of €5 million to the taxpayer which is basically being used as a Fine Gael propaganda machine to hoodwink taxpayers using their own money. This unit is about filtering the Taoiseach's party's...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Eoin Ó Broin: ...unit is to streamline Government communications, to co-ordinate, to train and to promote best practice. How much of the time of the 14 members of this unit is dedicated to that? How much of the €5 million budget is dedicated to those specific tasks? The only bit of work reported in the public domain which relates to that part of the function, which the Taoiseach says is integral,...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Mick Barry: ...serving the interests of the 1%, not those of the majority. Sometimes it is not easy to spin when one is in a tight corner. Many must be scratching their heads and asking what is the point of a €5 million strategic communications unit in the light of what happened in Washington in recent days. Many years ago someone in Hollywood made a movie called "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington"....

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Simon Coveney: ...was about co-ordinating communications across government in a professional manner to ensure money that is spent on communications gets good results. The truth is the Deputies speak about €5 million or €6 million but communications across the Government and its agencies costs in the region of €170 million per year, as the Deputy knows. There are approximately 750...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Dessie Ellis: ...Ministers. We now know that the unit comes at a substantial cost to the taxpayer. Whereas we were led to believe there would be no cost to the Exchequer, in 2018 alone it will cost approximately €5 million to run the unit. Surely, the competent and experienced civil servants working in it would be better employed elsewhere, rather than acting as the Government's cheerleaders. ...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Bríd Smith: We will support the motion and its idea of disbanding the strategic communications unit. It was ironic that, despite spending €5 million on slick PR and gathering the best and brightest minds in communications and social media, the Taoiseach revealed in a few minutes of hubris in Washington the reality of how the Government and the elite worked. Either the Government is not spending...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Marc MacSharry: The Tánaiste referred to cohesion, centralisation, cost-saving and the consolidation of websites. These are all admirable matters which do not cost €5 million. We are all for good communications, telling the truth, as well as portraying and giving the truth the complexion it deserves. Since its establishment, the strategic communications unit has used a new tagline, “A...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Danny Healy-Rae: ...to do that. Before the Government gets away with it, there will be many other battles here, there and everywhere because it is people's democratic right to build a house for themselves. The €5 million for the spin machine would help to provide more beds for people in places like Kerry General Hospital where there are 30 or 40 people on trolleys every day even at this time of year....

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Peadar Tóibín: ...cycle at the moment. How is the Government getting its message out there? By any measure, this is a failure. The political karma of Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, getting tripped up by his own €5 million spin factory is lost on no one.

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Mattie McGrath: ...bob here and there. We have people today from all over Ireland asking about the Tús schemes and the rural social schemes. Small money in each community would be wonderful but instead there is €5 million for this and that and €50 million for the other and nothing for ordinary people. My two colleagues are bussing people up to Belfast on nearly a weekly basis to get...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Pearse Doherty: ...who has recognised that the SCU was an error made by Fine Gael. The spin is continuing. A number of claims were made by the Taoiseach. He said that it was cost-neutral. We now know it cost €5 million. He said that it would be at arm's length from the Taoiseach's office, yet from freedom of information requests which have now been published by Hugh O'Connell and others we now...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Pearse Doherty: ...first revealed the Government’s plans to establish the SCU that the unit will be cost neutral to the Exchequer. These were the bold claims made by the Taoiseach before it turned out that, in fact, the unit would cost some €5 million this year and every other year. Other claims were then made about the wholesome and ethical nature of the unit and they have proven to be...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Leo Varadkar: ...the record for those interested in them. The establishment of the strategic communications unit, SCU, as a Civil Service unit in my Department was approved by Cabinet in September. A budget of €5 million from within my Department's existing envelope was allocated in October and a work programme was agreed by Cabinet in December. This was all done transparently. Approximately...

Strategic Communications Unit: Motion [Private Members] (20 Mar 2018)

Micheál Martin: ...has been disproven. It has been claimed that the unit is about streamlining Government communications and saving public money. The facts show this is nonsense. When the Taoiseach sought €5 million for this year's budget, the Department of Finance asked that this be subject to other Departments reducing their advertising budgets by this amount to prove the savings. The...