Results 41-60 of 213 for drugs speaker:Seán Crowe

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: National Drugs Strategy: Minister of State at the Department of Health (19 Jan 2022)

Seán Crowe: I welcome the Minister of State with responsibility for public health, well-being and the national drugs strategy, Deputy Feighan, who will provide the committee with an update on the national drugs strategy. I also welcome Mr. Jim Walsh, principal officer, from the drugs policy and social inclusion unit in the Department of Health, and Dr. Eamon Keenan, national clinical lead in addiction...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: National Drugs Strategy: Minister of State at the Department of Health (19 Jan 2022)

Seán Crowe: ...It is wrong to identify one building. If we are talking about going from Heuston Station, we only have to go up the boardwalk. It is all around Dublin. If people open their eyes, they will see drug dealing going on in many areas. Unfortunately, it is also outside of many drug rehabilitation centres. That is wrong. It is correct to call for the Garda to respond to this criminality,...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: National Drugs Strategy: Minister of State at the Department of Health (19 Jan 2022)

Seán Crowe: People are saying to me, and this is my view as well, that they have never seen it as bad. Open drug dealing has been mentioned. The amount of crack cocaine, as well as the fact that people are being addicted to crack cocaine, is the game changer that people are worried about. It is having an impact not only on individuals, families and children within those families, but also on...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: National Drugs Strategy: Minister of State at the Department of Health (19 Jan 2022)

Seán Crowe: ...meeting, Mr. Walsh talked about new structures being established. Can our guests send us a note about who is engaging in discussions about these new structures? Representatives of the CityWide Drugs Crisis Campaign attended a recent committee meeting. They were concerned that the community element seemed to have been done away with under the new structures. I am glad that there has...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: National Drugs Strategy: Minister of State at the Department of Health (19 Jan 2022)

Seán Crowe: It is touch and go with some strategy agencies attending drug task forces right across the country. Some areas have good attendance and others do not. It is something that needs to be addressed.

Written Answers — Department of Health: Health Services (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...has been made with regard to the allocation of the €500,000 to address the crack cocaine crisis announced as part of Budget 2022; if not, when this decision will be made in order that community drugs projects that are struggling to maintain services will have clarity on available funding from 1 January 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [59275/21]

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Substance Misuse and its Impact on Communities: Discussion (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: I welcome the following: Ms Anna Quigley, co-ordinator, CityWide Drugs Crisis Campaign; Ms Grace Hill, co-ordinator, the Tallaght Drug and Alcohol Task Force; and Mr. Shane Hamilton, co-ordinator, Jobstown Assisting Drug Dependency, JADD, Project. They are here to discuss the landscape of substance misuse and its impact on communities. Before the opening statements, I must point out to...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Substance Misuse and its Impact on Communities: Discussion (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: The amount of money the Tallaght Drug and Alcohol Task Force gets and whether the total is up or down can be addressed first and then the broader issue.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Substance Misuse and its Impact on Communities: Discussion (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: The point has been made about funding for the area. Mr. Hamilton spoke about how staff were upskilled and the best of staff being within the front-line services. A bit like the funding the drugs task force does not get, is it similar with community-based projects in that many of the workers are section 39 workers and have not had a rise in ten years? Is there a problem? It probably...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Substance Misuse and its Impact on Communities: Discussion (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: Mr. Hamilton talked about open drug dealing in the area. It sends the wrong message, particularly to young people within those communities. Mr. Hamilton also talked about the projects being kept open during the pandemic. Something else that happened during the pandemic was that people noticed gangs gathering at particular sites and so on more often. People could not understand it because...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Substance Misuse and its Impact on Communities: Discussion (1 Dec 2021)

Seán Crowe: Considering the amount of money being made by international cartels with the drugs being shipped into Ireland and being sold, people are conscious that the Criminal Assets Bureau, CAB, has had many successes over the years. Yesterday I read about €1.3 million. We read this regularly in our newspapers. Drugs task forces and other groups have proposed that that money should be...

Road Traffic and Roads Bill 2021: Second Stage (Resumed) (17 Nov 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...or high-visibility clothing. They tear up and down the streets on dark evenings. There are near misses everyday involving children or elderly people out with prams. Last week the Tallaght Drug and Alcohol Task Force published a comprehensive report on the effects of crack cocaine in the area. The Minister probably saw it reported in the media. Even in that report, the bikes...

Saincheisteanna Tráthúla - Topical Issue Debate: Drug Dealing (9 Nov 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...problem. It is a major challenge. I do not know if it will shock the Minister of State, but I know of families where grandparents, parents and their children in one household are involved in drug addiction. I do not know if it will surprise her that I am aware of people in their 70s presenting in Tallaght hospital with symptoms of drug use. That is the challenge we are facing. It...

Saincheisteanna Tráthúla - Topical Issue Debate: Drug Dealing (9 Nov 2021)

Seán Crowe: ..., we are starting to see it happening in Ireland. Crack cocaine has the potential to destroy individuals and their families but it also puts enormous pressure on communities. The Tallaght drugs and alcohol task force, which also covers Whitechurch, serves a catchment area containing twice as many people and it does so with less money than it had ten years ago. That is not acceptable....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: General Scheme of the Public Health (Tobacco and Nicotine Inhaling Products) Bill 2019: Department of Health (3 Nov 2021)

Seán Crowe: We were referring to regulation and the difficulty of banning a particular product. I cite the example of the head shops and some of the drugs that were coming in. The shops then changed the names or changed one of the elements of a product and so on. This presented difficulties for legislators in trying to keep up with that, which was almost impossible. Are we into a similar situation...

Ceisteanna ar Reachtaíocht a Gealladh - Questions on Promised Legislation (7 Oct 2021)

Seán Crowe: The programme for Government rightly lauds the important work local drugs task forces do, but nowhere does it mention giving a pay rise to section 39 workers, who have not seen an increase in more than ten years, or address the cuts over that period. Does the Government intend to rectify this and stop the flood of fully qualified addiction counsellors and other personnel moving to the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Medical Cannabis Access Programme Update: Discussion (29 Sep 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...; from the Department of Health, Mr. Muiris O'Connor, assistant secretary, research and development and health analytics division, Ms Anne Marie Seymour, principal officer, medicines, controlled drugs and pharmacy legislation unit, and Mr. Conor Brennan, assistant principal officer, medicines, controlled drugs and pharmacy legislation unit; and from the Health Products Regulatory...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health: Medical Cannabis Access Programme Update: Discussion (29 Sep 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...been calls for cannabis products to be made available to Irish patients. My understanding is that trying to get this product involves a fairly tortuous route. Those patients believe that these drugs work for them and are transformative. In many cases, they have tried everything else and this is their last hope. I understand people travelling abroad to try to get access, particularly if...

Criminal Justice (Public Order) (Quadbikes and Scramblers) (Amendment) Bill 2021: Second Stage [Private Members] (23 Sep 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...these scramblers and bikes. Our parks and green areas should be inclusive spaces, but in many cases they are not. There is also clear evidence these bikes are being used by some to transport drugs within our communities. I would like the Garda to be empowered to be more proactive in tackling that through seizures, but that is part of the difficulty we have faced in the past. I...

Written Answers — Department of Health: Health Services (27 Jul 2021)

Seán Crowe: ...Minister for Health if he will provide additional detail on the targeted funding alluded to in recent comments to the media by the Minister of State for Public Health, Wellbeing and the National Drugs Strategy to local drugs task forces in areas in which crack cocaine has become a serious issue; the increased supports and resources that will be made available; and the level of funding that...