Frank Feighan (Fine Gael)

I join colleagues in condemning the attack on the proposal to award pensions to councillors. Everyone has a go at councillors but it has gone too far this time. Public sector pensions are very attractive and agents of the public sector who virtually act as a public relations department and liaise between constituents and Government and county councils should have their work recognised.

Surgeons who have treated young people and adults injured by fireworks stated in one of today's newspapers that the public awareness campaign highlighting the dangers of fireworks has failed. Could the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government come before the House and outline what he intends to do on this issue because there is a degree of hypocrisy surrounding it? Fireworks are illegal in the Republic of Ireland but we see extensive breaches of the law at Halloween. The law should be either amended or examined. Last year, I spoke with two tourists in Dublin who said the city looked like a scene from a film by Quentin Tarantino. I explained to them that fireworks were illegal, which they could not believe, so we must try to amend the law.