Results 49,161-49,180 of 51,299 for speaker:Micheál Martin
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: No, he did not. I am stating in the House that the Deputy needs to realise that producing websites is not the panacea for bringing prices down, that one must make concrete, substantive legislative change to make an impact.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: In that respect, the Deputy is not giving due credit to our attempts, particularly in the context of the amendment of the Competition Act, to make a beneficial impact on prices.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: We all know what has been happening internationally on energy prices.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: We know we depend significantly on imported energy. We have some structural issues that other countries do not have, for example, a strong reliance on fossil fuel energy which has cost implications.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: The only reason I mentioned the impact of energy prices on our inflation was that if one removes the importation of energy, Irish inflation shows a good performance in the degree to which it is converging with the EU average inflation rate of 2.5%.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: Rubbish.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: When Government establishes a regulatory regime and regulators the last thing it should do is interfere, intervene or try to undermine them. The idea behind developing a liberal and competitive market is that it should be regulated independently of Government. It is facile and over-simplistic of the Deputy to label all sectors as filtering back to Government through local authorities and...
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: I have seen no downward pressure, however, on rates, development charges or any other charges from those local authorities.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: There is a lack of any real and substantive commitment to the issue of prices generally. That is the reality. On the wider issue, inflation is approximately 2.3%.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: That is a significant improvement on recent years. I do not accept the fundamental tenet of the Opposition's proposition, particularly in the context of this year's Estimates for local authorities.
- Economic Competitiveness. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: Members of Deputy Hogan's party would abandon the increase in some counties without due regard for business or competitive issues.
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: The issue of increasing penalties for non-compliance with employment rights legislation is likely to be raised in the course of the social partnership talks and will be addressed by the Government in that context. The Government takes the view that penalties should be proportionate in scale and effective in impact. The imposition of penalties for non-compliance as well as redressing...
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: Generally we agree with the Opposition in that we would like to see an increase in the penalties to act as a greater deterrent. While we are not waiting for social partnership discussions to conclude it will be discussed in that context. We are in favour of strong deterrents to prevent unscrupulous employers from breaking the law. Our preferred policy, on which we have worked with the social...
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: I have formulated legislation which is going through House. If the Deputy co-operates we can get it through quickly. Committee Stage is scheduled for next week.
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: We will find out soon when it is to be debated. It has reached Committee Stage. That is a substantive Bill to protect migrant workers. There is no point disagreeing. Most people accept it is a substantial advance on the current position.
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: That is action. An additional 95,000 people worked in the Irish economy last year. The Government has taken plenty of action on the economic front and in respect of the broad corpus of legislation in place.
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: We have passed the Minimum Notice and Terms of Employment Act, the Redundancy Payments Act, the Protection of Employment Act, the Unfair Dismissals Act, the Payment of Wages Act etc.
- Employment Legislation. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: I do too.
- Industrial Development. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: Job creation and retention in Enterprise Ireland-supported companies are day-to-day matters for the agency itself, and not ones in which I am directly involved. Provisional figures indicate that in 2005 the number of jobs gained in Enterprise Ireland companies amounted to 12,212. That was offset by job losses of 12,430, giving a net decline of 218. I emphasise that those 2005 figures are...
- Industrial Development. (7 Feb 2006)
Micheál Martin: They come with a warning.