Results 9,401-9,420 of 10,035 for speaker:Martin Cullen

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: What if the deputy leader of my party had copied the deputy leader of the Green Party in calling for a major economic recession in order to stop road developments?

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: That is excellent policy in the style of the Greens. What would happen if a member of my party managed to come up with any of the wild-eyed conspiracies which are so much a part of Patricia McKenna's approach to politics? What if a member of any other party showed Deputy Gormley's liking for promoting any new slur——

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: ——such as he did against the Tánaiste during the election?

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: Deputy Boyle and his colleagues will not faze me. I agree with the Greens that they do not operate to the standards of everyone else. They are more cynical and opportunistic than most.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: This should be no surprise to anyone, as they sit comfortably in a group which contains people who have taken approaches which directly undermine our environment. They sit beside Deputy Joe Higgins, who decided to go to jail in order to try to destroy a measure to deal with our waste crisis.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: The House will surely not forget that Deputy Higgins announced on national radio that he waited until he was sitting snugly in his cell before taking the time to read anything about waste policy.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: Unlike Deputy Boyle, I have policies which I will explain to the House. I am sorry that Deputy Morgan has left the House. The Greens also sit with the Sinn Féin Party, which has a one-size-fits-all approach to issues — whatever it is, it is against it. I congratulate its Deputies for sharing with us their opposition to illegal dumping — except, of course, when it involves semtex and...

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: They adopt the Leona Helmsley approach to politics — detailed policy is for the little people.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: I know that.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: They live in a world without choices — a world in which there is a magic wand that can solve every problem, which is hidden because of a deep conspiracy. I reject this approach to politics, just as I have no problem in rejecting this motion and saying to the House that I am proud of my record as a member of Cabinet. Waste management has been my highest priority since coming into office. I...

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: They require us to continue radical transformation of our waste management practices. This inevitably involves tackling difficult issues and making hard choices. It involves taking decisions, something which is not the Green Party's forte. Just as there are 40 shades of green, there are 40 shades of Green Party policy.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: Many of them are sickly shades. The end result is a complete mish-mash, which means absolutely nothing to anybody, not even the Green Party Members opposite. Lacking in the courage and capacity to make difficult decisions, the Green Party's solution is to try to convince us all that decisions do not need to be made in the first place. Because they cannot put forward a credible policy of their...

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: It would have us believe that we can simply wish our waste away. Deputy Sargent, the Dáil's equivalent of Paul Daniels, can just click his fingers and utter the magic words "zero waste" and our waste disappears.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: The use of the word "zero" in the context of Green Party waste policy is certainly appropriate — zero marks for zero credibility.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: Yes, every detail, and it did not take me long. It will not take the children in school long to read it either. In the real world, where I live and where the electorate expects the Government to live, things are different. We are following a policy approach proven to be effective by the best waste managers in Europe.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: This means that in the first place we prevent, re-use and recycle as much of our waste as we can.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: Then, in line with best European practice, the policy is that we should recover energy from waste through the use of thermal treatment technologies, ensuring that the amount of waste we ultimately consign to landfill — the least environmentally friendly approach — is kept to an absolute minimum. At the mention of thermal treatment the Green Party members turn hysterical. Yet their Green...

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: This Government's clear policy approach to waste management is yielding results. Next week I will outline details of the progress made on the implementation of local authority waste management plans. While there is further work to do, substantial progress has already been made and is continuing. I thank the people for this.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: The Deputy should save it for impressing his own party colleagues, because he is not impressing anyone in the House with that nonsense.

Confidence in the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government: Motion. (30 Mar 2004)

Martin Cullen: This has been supported by a major package of Government funding. I have allocated €22 million in the past 18 months to support the delivery of more than 70 local authority recycling projects. This funding has been provided courtesy of the environment fund, which is financed by the proceeds of the plastic bags and landfill levies. This is an imaginative use of policy instruments by the...