Results 10,401-10,420 of 29,533 for speaker:Brendan Howlin

Other Questions: Budget 2015 (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: The Deputy has quite rightly encapsulated Government policy, which is to ensure that we have restored the economic fortunes of the State to have a sustainable platform into the future that will attract inward investment, which we have seen in spades, with more inward investment in the past year than we have seen for a very long time. There is a jobs dividend from that, which will allow the...

Other Questions: Public Sector Staff Sick Leave (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: They do not get pregnant.

Other Questions: Public Sector Staff Sick Leave (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Everybody gets their own outing now, even if it is the same question.

Other Questions: Public Sector Staff Sick Leave (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: The need to protect and support women during pregnancy and ensure that they are not discriminated against is a priority strongly reflected in the design of the new public service sick leave scheme.  We brought this to the Labour Court and specifically asked it to consider additional protection for women. The new scheme operates strictly in accordance with the European...

Other Questions: Free Travel Scheme Review (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: I am free not to reduce it.

Other Questions: Free Travel Scheme Review (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: The Deputy is making a compelling case for the review under way. We need to examine all of the elements to which he referred. What is provided? Is it value for money for the State? Is there fraud? Is the scheme being availed of by the people who need it? Are they utilising it to the full? These are the questions that will be answered in the review which will be published once it is...

Other Questions: Free Travel Scheme Review (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: The Deputy has made some valid points well. I hope all of these issues will be addressed in the review being led by the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport. I do not know if the Deputy is involved on the transport committee, but he might well attend it to have a full and robust debate on this issue. Perhaps the individual service providers might be asked to attend the committee once...

Other Questions: Public Sector Staff Sick Leave (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: The legal position on the treatment of pregnancy-related illness, in particular the issue raised in the Deputy's question, is set out in a European Court of Justice ruling in the McKenna case. This case addressed, inter alia, the counting of sick leave for pregnancy-related illness. The court considered it was not discriminatory for pregnancy-related absences to be offset...

Other Questions: Public Sector Staff Sick Leave (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Pregnancy is not an illness. Obviously, people are entitled to maternity leave. If there are illnesses associated with pregnancy, they are, as I indicated, treated in a special way. The Deputy is saying someone who has a pregnancy-related illness is anxious that she might be ill for another reason later after the pregnancy. We can address when that might happen as opposed to being anxious...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Reform (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: I have not commissioned any independent analysis on potential savings in the health sector since March 2011. That would be a matter for the Minister for Health, as the Government has line Departments with line Ministers responsible for their own areas. In terms of analysis, a comprehensive review of expenditure was carried out during 2011 and was published in December 2011 in conjunction...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Reform (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: It has the knowledge.

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Reform (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Most of these questions would be more appropriately directed to the Minister for Health, because an enormous reform agenda is under way. This is because the structure that was put in place, which basically built the superstructure of the HSE on top of the old health boards, simply has not worked and has been extraordinarily top-heavy and to disentangle it involves a huge body of work. Were...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Reform (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: All these questions are appropriate for the Minister for Health and not for me. While I obviously must mind the money and make sure the Government gets value for money, specific policy issues regarding the Department of Health come to the Government from the Minister for Health. However, there is a Cabinet sub-committee on health at which these matters are thrashed out clearly. There is a...

Other Questions: Free Travel Scheme Review (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: In March 2012, the Ministers for Social Protection and Transport, Tourism and Sport agreed to establish an interdepartmental working group to examine and report on the operation and future development of the free travel scheme. The review has been led by the Department of Social Protection but also comprised officials from the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport, the National...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Equality Proofing of Budgets (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: I have answered the question a couple of times but I will do so again. One cannot look at each budget, particularly a series of crisis budgets, in isolation. One must look at the cumulative effect of budgets. For example, the analysis done by some looks at all taxation increases as being progressive, even if one has reached the very highest marginal rate of taxation in comparison with any...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Public Procurement Contracts (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Public procurement procedures require all applicants to meet specified standards when applying for public contracts. In this regard, applicants are required to make signed declarations in respect of their financial standing, their legal standing and their payment of taxes and social contributions. The criteria on which contracting authorities may exclude applicants from the award procedure...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Public Procurement Contracts (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: I must say I am taken aback by the charges the Deputy has made. It is a legal responsibility for each contracting authority to comply with the law and to ensure contracts are fully compliant with the law. In the case of roads, it is a matter for the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport and the National Roads Authority, while in the case of schools it is a matter for the Department of...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Public Procurement Contracts (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: It is a matter of legal compliance. Contractors have to sign statutory declarations. There is a legal consequence which would make them subject not only to action but to debarment from public contracts should the matters the Deputy set out be proved to be true. If they Deputy sends me the details, I will ensure the line Departments act on them. I do not think it is up to me to have...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Budget 2015 (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Every decision that was made in advance of the budgets of the last three years, as delivered by the Minister, Deputy Noonan, and me, was aimed at repairing an economy that was calamitously broken. Objectively, we have done a good job in building a sustainable platform for future expenditure and the future well-being of the Irish people. On each occasion, we made decisions that were the...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Budget 2015 (9 Jul 2014)

Brendan Howlin: Rather than responding to the views of the Deputy, who has been far from objective from the beginning, I will leave it to a more objective person to make a determination on whether our budgetary strategy has been successful.