Results 1,241-1,260 of 1,354 for speaker:Robbie Gallagher

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade, and Defence: Passport Service: Senator Robbie Gallagher (9 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the Deputies and Senators for their comments. While I take Deputy Crowe's well-made point about Belfast, I remind the committee that Belfast is a strong and vibrant city. I am concentrating here on an area of rural Ireland and a region that is trying to catch up with the big cities in the rest of the country. Perhaps we should be looking at Deputy Crowe's suggestion, but my main...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade, and Defence: Passport Service: Senator Robbie Gallagher (9 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the joint committee.

Seanad: Amendments to Councillors' Conditions: Statements (8 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach. "Respect" and "fairness" are two words that should be central to any debate on councillors' remuneration. Having been a county councillor for 18 years, I have no doubt that being a county councillor is a full-time job. The workload has increased and is now unrecognisable. Unfortunately, the salary available to councillors does not...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Education and Skills: Equal Status (Admission to Schools) Bill 2016: Discussion (7 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Go raibh maith agat a Chathaoirligh. I welcome the witnesses this afternoon. I enjoyed their presentations and statements and found them very informative. It is a useful excercise and I am sure they themselves enjoyed the statements and contributions from their colleagues around the table. In the part of the world that I come from this particular issue is in many ways a foreign land....

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Road Improvement Schemes (7 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach. The Minister is welcome and I thank him for his attendance. I refer to phase 3 of a project to remove bad bends on the N2, the Dublin to Derry road, along the stretch from Monaghan town to Emyvale.In 2017, Transport Infrastructure Ireland allocated €600,000 towards this project, which will be phase 3 up as far as Emyvale village....

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Road Improvement Schemes (7 Feb 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the Minister for his response. As he has outlined, we have a serious problem on the stretch of roadway from Ardee to the Border. Unfortunately, fatalities occur there too often. It is ironic and sad that as we discuss this issue there was a fatality earlier this morning. It highlights the urgency attached to this particular stretch of roadway. I do not know the number of...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Ambulance Service Response Times (31 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Ba mhaith liom fáilte a chur roimh an Aire Stáit. I am raising the response times to ambulance call-outs in counties Monaghan and Cavan in the context of two very serious and life-threatening incidents that occurred in the north Monaghan area at the end of December 2016 and the beginning of January 2017. One person collapsed in a shopping centre in Monaghan and another person fell...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Ambulance Service Response Times (31 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the Minister of State for her response. I welcome the statement that additional resources will be allocated which, as I said, are very much needed. When I was first alerted to this incident in Monaghan in the first week in January I contacted the HSE. The incident caused great concern to the people of that county. I asked for the reason for the delay. We are now entering February...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Ambulance Service Response Times (31 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: That has been done.

Seanad: Order of Business (31 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I join others in congratulating Mr. Martin Groves on his appointment. I have no doubt that he will be a huge success in the position. I wish to raise the issue today of the availability of substitute school teachers at primary and secondary level. School principals throughout the country are reporting making 20 or 30 phone calls to try to get teachers to step in when needed, unfortunately...

Seanad: Order of Business (26 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: This week four years ago, 41 year old Detective Garda Adrian Donohoe who was shot dead while guarding a cash escort outside Lordship Credit Union in County Louth. Adrian, a young man from County Cavan, found himself in County Louth as a member of the Garda, where he embodied everything that was good about An Garda Síochána. He totally immersed himself in his new home and got...

Seanad: Northern Ireland: Statements (26 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach. I extend my best wishes to the former deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness. I acknowledge Mr. McGuinness's contribution to the peace process and his commitment to the institutions when they were established. I will not claim he and I have sung from the same hymn sheet at all times, as that was certainly not the case, but it would...

Seanad: Junior Cycle Reform: Motion (25 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire go dtí an Teach seo inniu. Fianna Fáil supports the need to maintain history as a core subject under the junior certificate reforms. Let us hope that history will continue to be essential to the three year curriculum and that it will be taken by as many children as possible. The small percentage of students - I understand it is between 5% and 8% -...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: North-South Interconnector (24 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I propose to share one minute of my time with Senator Diarmuid Wilson.

Seanad: Commencement Matters: North-South Interconnector (24 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit go dtí an Teach. An Bord Pleanála published its decision on the North-South interconnector just before Christmas. It is remarkable in the case of a project of such magnitude that the decision has only nine conditions attached. An ordinary punter would have more conditions attached to a proposal for an extension to a dwelling house....

Seanad: Commencement Matters: North-South Interconnector (24 Jan 2017)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the Minister of State for his response. Looking at the issue objectively, if one was living in Cork or Donegal and examined the process, one would see there was a planning application, that there were oral hearings and that An Bord Pleanála would then make its decision. One would think it was a fair and detailed process. However, it is only when one is close to it that one...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Road Network (15 Dec 2016)

Robbie Gallagher: I raise the issue of the need for increased funding for local roads in counties Monaghan and Cavan and record our appreciation of the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Shane Ross, who met a delegation from Monaghan County Council a few weeks go, for which I thank him. The condition of roads in County Monaghan is particularly poor. There are a number of considerations we...

Seanad: Commencement Matters: Road Network (15 Dec 2016)

Robbie Gallagher: I thank the Minister of State for his response. I welcome the fact there will be an increase in funding for regional and local roads in 2017 but I am disappointed with the word "modest". Monaghan and Cavan are classified as a special case and I ask that additional funding is forthcoming.

Seanad: Order of Business (15 Dec 2016)

Robbie Gallagher: Hear, hear.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2016: Report and Final Stages (14 Dec 2016)

Robbie Gallagher: I put on record my support for what the previous two speakers said on mortgages. We in Fianna Fáil were slightly disappointed, in particular those of us who come from a Border area, in terms of provisions relating to Brexit. I felt that more could have been done in that regard, specifically for businesses along the Border. Something must be done to cushion them from the future effects...