Results 20,181-20,200 of 21,525 for speaker:Mary Lou McDonald

Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Amendment) Bill 2011: From the Seanad (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I move amendment No. 1 to amendment No. 1: In the sixth row of column two of the table to delete "20 per cent" and substitute "100 per cent" We have debated this matter before. There is an air of unreality in the way the Minister is dealing with the whole issue. The average public sector pension is in the region of €20,000 to €30,000 per annum. We must get back to first principles....

Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Amendment) Bill 2011: From the Seanad (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I just do not buy the Minister's line of argument. He claims a levy has to be proportionate. Accordingly, he considers a 20% levy on pensions over €100,000 proportionate, fair and defensible.

Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Amendment) Bill 2011: From the Seanad (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I fully understand it. By the way, for the record, I am not grandstanding on this issue.

Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Amendment) Bill 2011: From the Seanad (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I have pursued this matter with the Minister for months on end. When I suggested to him in respect of the big pension pay-outs that he claw them back or even not pay them, the Minister told me initially the Attorney General's advice was it could not be done. However, he clearly can impose levies because he has set out such a scheme of levies in this legislation. Again, however, the Attorney...

Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest (Amendment) Bill 2011: From the Seanad (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: Can the Minister publish the advice? Can he share it with us?

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I could not hear the Ceann Comhairle.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I have raised this matter with the Minister for Education and Skills, Deputy Ruairí Quinn, and it was also raised with the Taoiseach yesterday. I hope it will be a case of third time lucky today. The Tánaiste claims wrongly that the budget was balanced, that it does not have negative consequences for women and children, in particular, and that the pupil-teacher ratio is left untouched....

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I ask the Tánaiste, on the basis of his position in Government, but particularly as leader of the Labour Party, to tell the Dáil that he will have this cut reversed. I ask him, as leader of a party which I understood was wedded to a notion of equality, as leader of a party which has elected representatives in many of the constituencies and communities that will be devastated by this cut,...

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: The Tánaiste accused me of making things up. I wonder whether, when the principals came to meet his colleague, the latter equally told them that they were making things up when they set out in graphic detail, I am sure, the consequences of moving a pupil-teacher ratio of 15:1 to one of 22:1 as was then envisaged. Even the response the Tánaiste has just given indicates that teaching posts...

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: The Tánaiste says these are legacy posts. I ask him not to come in here and insult the intelligence of the Dáil or the intelligence of the general public with that type of connivance. What will his legacy to the education of these children be?

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I find it deeply ironic that the Labour Party in government seeks to sabotage the work done by a previous Minister for Education of that party. I have to say, Eamon Gilmore, you are some piece of work to talk about equality.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: It is a perverse logic articulated by the Tánaiste today that we must have an equality in deprivation.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: There is a reason that these particular schools were allocated a preferential pupil-teacher ratio.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: All of the documentation reflects the fact that this size of class is working for children who need a greater level of support.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: How can the Tánaiste, with any honour - how can he, as leader of the Labour Party, with any honour - say to the children of Sheriff Street, East Wall, or the Inishowen peninsula----

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: -----that these are legacy matters? That is some legacy for the Tánaiste.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: The Tánaiste knows full well.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: Pardon me?

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: I thank the Tánaiste.

Leaders' Questions (15 Dec 2011)

Mary Lou McDonald: What the Tánaiste is proposing is inadequate-----