Seanad debates

Tuesday, 14 December 2010

3:00 pm

Photo of Donie CassidyDonie Cassidy (Fianna Fail)

Senators Fitzgerald, O'Toole, Bacik, Boyle, Ross, MacSharry, McFadden, Norris, Callely, Buttimer, Hanafin, O'Reilly, Prendergast, Feeney, Healy Eames, Glynn, Mullen and Bradford expressed their support for the Minister for Finance's decision in regard to the 2,400 plus AIB staff and their bonuses totalling €40 million. I welcome his decision and legislation will come before the House for its consideration during the week in regard to it. Legislation on financial matters will be before the House today, tomorrow and on Thursday. We will have ample opportunity to make the important points on banking and financial issues to the Minister and the staff of the Department over the coming three days.

RTE and the "Prime Time Investigates" team are to be congratulated on bringing to the attention of the nation the difficulties being experienced by the HSE in regard to home care packages. What we saw in the programme was appalling and shocking. Those of us who served for a long time on the health boards and who are totally committed to providing the best possible care to all patients could not condone what we saw on our television screens last night.

As regard the quality and standard of care and the good job the Health Information and Quality Authority is doing, there is a further work to be done. As I said many times, tens of thousands of carers are doing an incredible job but that 0.1% of people demean all the good work they do. I have no difficulty discussing this issue after Christmas and inviting the Minister for Health and Children to the House to update it on the proposals in regard to those not caring for our senior citizens. Our senior citizens should be thanked for all they did in their lifetimes in making a contribution to our country. I have no difficulty in allowing plenty of time for this issue to be discussed and debated.

Senators Bacik, Ormonde and Harris asked for a debate on the OECD report. I propose to have statements on this next Friday. I have no difficulty in allowing this debate to be continued after the Christmas recess. It is most important that this matter is discussed and debated in the House before the Christmas recess.

Senators Coffey and Ó Brolcháin asked for a debate on competitiveness, stimulus packages and growth and on the strength of our exports. I welcome the 107 new jobs announced for Galway by Hewlett Packard. The significant investment by the Government in research and development was one of the main reasons cited by the company. I congratulate everyone concerned, IDA Ireland, the Minister and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation who helped bring these jobs to Galway. I congratulate the lucky people of County Galway, 70 of whom are to commence work immediately.

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