Results 361-380 of 445 for speaker:Eoghan Harris

Seanad: Finance Bill 2008 (Certified Money Bill): Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (13 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: I congratulate the Minister on the mastery of his colleague's brief and on his latitude in answering questions with his usual liberal effectiveness.

Seanad: Order of Business (13 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: Given the amount of criticism public bodies get in this country, I am sure the Leader, on behalf of the House, will be keen to record his appreciation of the manner in which the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment discharged its public duty yesterday. Despite having to operate in the middle of a media firestorm, it held its nerve and advised the Minister to retain the poetry of...

Seanad: Order of Business (13 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: There are very few moments of this nature in Irish history. It is very easy to join a consensus, add to the media firestorm and support those who wish to stone Cathal Ó Searcaigh. The founder of Christianity would not have been found in such a mob. Media mobs are easy to assemble. They have been assembled for all sorts of people in Irish society, from the Taoiseach down. It is difficult...

Seanad: Order of Business (13 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: It was as important as the decision to open Croke Park or any other decision that took moral courage. I say "well done" to those who make the decision, which we should salute.

Seanad: Order of Business (12 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: I strongly support Senator O'Toole's remarks about the question of politicians' trips. Normally, I find myself in agreement with Senator Fitzgerald on almost everything. I understand that in the pursuit of prudent expenditure of public money she would want to look out for that, and quite rightly so. I want to deal with the more general point. I have noticed in recent times, perhaps...

Seanad: Order of Business (12 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: Not everyone likes to travel. People speak of travel nowadays as if it were a luxury to get on a plane. Everyone travels nowadays. Such trips are quite hard work for the people concerned and are tiring. Nobody who is past the age of 24 wants to be flying around the world to meet the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick. It is necessary work for the Irish people. It is bad for politicians to...

Seanad: Defamation Bill 2006: Report and Final Stages (11 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: We have a Press Council and a press ombudsman and between those two bodies any politician here who is worried about himself or herself is well protected from simple lies. What we are talking about is the constant racket of money making, particularly on the part of the most powerful people in society who are the first up to charge the newspapers with defamation or libel. I have never heard...

Seanad: Defamation Bill 2006: Report and Final Stages (11 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: Hear, hear.

Seanad: Defamation Bill 2006: Report and Final Stages (11 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: I still find it difficult to believe that a group of legislators who are responsible for changing the libel laws would speak as Senators Norris and Mullen have and appeal to the Minister to circle the wagons around elected politicians. If the average member of the public could see what goes on in The Irish Times or the Irish Examiner every day and the way the libel laws are used to protect...

Seanad: Defamation Bill 2006: Report and Final Stages (11 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: I concur with Senator Alex White on his distinction between opinion and fact. I was indisposed during the earlier Stages of this Bill but, on the occasions on which I could have contributed, I felt I would have been regarded as having had a vested interest. However, I must speak on the question of fact and opinion simply because I have been astounded in recent weeks by the absolute...

Seanad: Order of Business (11 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: I support Senator Fitzgerald's call for the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform to look at the issue of the retirement age for gardaí. I call for a general debate on age in Irish society, not just simply in terms of restrictive employment practices, etc. but in terms of its wider parameters. Last night in Cork I attended the three-hour testimonial to Dan Donovan, one of the...

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: Hear, hear.

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: On a point of order——

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: On a point of order, the two last speakers have described my tempered remarks as a "rant"——

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: The remarks made about the Chairman of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources are unfounded. I read the letter. It is a very calm letter and it sets out, in some detail, to query the wisdom of 18 RTE reporters interviewing, in many cases, each other about the tribunal. It is very hard to argue that this should not more properly be the business of RTE...

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: ——and that 18 RTE reporters should be deployed on it. RTE senior personnel were very quick to query and express their unease at my appearance on "The Late Late Show". However, none of them mentioned, nor did anyone on the Oireachtas committee, to be fair, that on the previous week's "The Late Late Show", there had been great criticism of the Government and the week before that there had...

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: It just shows that RTE has a very deficient notion of balance at the moment.

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: All of this arises from the distortion caused by tribunals themselves. I am actually surprised——

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: The problem is that other people go down the road but I am stopped from going down it. I am not specifically going down the road of the Mahon tribunal.

Seanad: Order of Business. (4 Mar 2008)

Eoghan Harris: The question of tribunals needs to be examined. I remember suffering indirectly under the first one set up on money lending by Fianna Fáil. I have no brief for Fianna Fáil in tribunals. I do not agree with tribunals because they do not give due process. We need a debate on the operation of tribunals in this country, as a general proposition because there is a new symbiotic relationship...