Results 11,301-11,320 of 40,330 for speaker:Leo Varadkar
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: To make that possible, we need investment in infrastructure, including investment in transport, and we need to look at Cork in the round, not just the city area but the whole city region stretching into west Cork, as well as east and north Cork, of course. In terms the Deputy's specific suggestion, I will take it up with TII and the National Transport Authority, NTA. We have had mixed...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: In 1886, we had railways all over the country. We did not have so many roads and we had no dual carriageways, no motorways and very few people owned cars, so it was a very different world back then. It was the development of the roads and the expansion in car ownership that caused the railways to close in the first place because they became non-viable. When it comes to Cork, as the...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: We agree that supply is the solution. We have a rising population, increasing by about 1.5% a year - very few countries in the western world have a population increasing as fast as ours - and we also have an emerging phenomenon of smaller household sizes, so we need a great deal of extra housing every year just to stand still. We agree that supply is the solution to the underlying problem,...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: Treating the entire country the same when it comes to rents is a mistake and it might do more harm than good. The other concern we had with a rent cap, as in zero increases, is that it in itself might affect supply. We know that to deal with this problem-----
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: -----we need more properties available to rent. We need people to rent out properties they own.
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: A major concern was that by having a cap it might reduce supply, thereby not allowing us to solve the underlying problem, which we acknowledge is supply.
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: I acknowledge, as does everyone on these benches, that rents in Ireland are very high, particularly high in our cities, and have become unaffordable for many people who, as the Deputy has said, are forced to opt for long commutes instead. That is why we introduced the rent-pressure zones. They have only been in place for a few years. There is evidence from the RTB's quarterly reports that...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: Some 18,000 new homes were built last year and we are aiming to have more than 20,000 homes built this year - around 25,000 in fact. The policy is to ensure there is a greater supply of housing: social housing for people on the housing lists; private housing for people who want to buy because most people want to buy their own home; and places available for people to rent. Any other...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: The Deputy is trying to twist my words again. I said I could not comment on those individual cases because I do not know the facts. The accusations she made concerned what was said about the Government, not those individual cases. The Deputy asked about solutions. I provided the solutions to her. I pointed towards the three areas in which we are implementing solutions. I have not heard,...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: The number of people waiting for an operation or procedure for more than a year is 21,477 in Northern Ireland, compared with 4,900 here, representing 1.1% of the population of Northern Ireland compared with 0.1% here. The number of people waiting more than a year for an outpatient appointment in Northern Ireland is 94,000, compared with 89,000 here, which is 5.2% of the population compared...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: Sinn Féin had the opportunity to show people what could be done. It controlled the Department of Health in Northern Ireland-----
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: -----and it failed. Why should anyone believe that it would do a better job?
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: I am afraid I cannot comment on those individual cases without knowing all the facts. I do know and understand the enormous inconvenience and suffering that hospital overcrowding causes patients and their families who care for them, and also the stress and pressures it puts on staff. I say that as somebody who spent over a year working in emergency departments in three different hospitals,...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: If we take the first three months of this year, according to the HSE we have had the lowest levels of overcrowding in five years. Even taking the nurses' figures, which cannot really be used for year-on-year comparisons because they change the way they count them every year, or at least have changed the way they count them on a few occasions in recent years, their figures show fewer patients...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: -----and in Clonmel and many other places as well. By the end of this year, we will be back up to about 11,000 beds in our acute hospital system. That is the highest number since 2009, reversing the policy of the previous Fianna Fáil and Green Party Government to reduce the number of hospital beds, by restoring those beds. The second area is better use of our existing bed capacity....
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: The Deputy is again engaging in conspiracy theories. To the best of my knowledge, the information that was on the front page of the Irish Examiner was not a leak, it was on foot of a freedom of information request made by that newspaper, so the Deputy is really into his conspiracy theories again. A newspaper makes a freedom of information request-----
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: -----it has a story and puts it on the front page and the Deputy imagines that there is a leak or a conspiracy involved but I am sure the Irish Examinercan confirm whether it was a leak or was down to good journalism by the newspaper by putting in a freedom of information request. On what happened at the time, it is important to bear in mind what was happening at the time.
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: Women were attending GP surgeries, they were very concerned about their smear tests being inaccurate and in many cases they were asking for a repeat smear test. This was the major issue coming up on the helpline, the NAGP called for repeat smear tests, the Irish Medical Organisation, IMO signed an agreement to provide them and it was welcomed by the Opposition. Some Opposition spokespersons...
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: The Deputy does not know that.
- Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (9 Apr 2019)
Leo Varadkar: Does the Deputy have any evidence of that?