Seanad debates

Tuesday, 21 June 2011

2:30 pm

Photo of Thomas ByrneThomas Byrne (Fianna Fail)

Without wishing to breach the sub judice rule I want to endorse what Senator Mullen stated earlier. I am very concerned about reports of current court actions concerning nursing homes in County Meath and the issue is worthy of further debate. I will say no more about the issue until a decision has been made but I would hope the courts will come to a decision on that very quickly because it is a serious position for the residents.

It is encouraging to see that substantial savings have been made under the Croke Park agreement, and I am proud to be part of the Government which put that agreement in place. It is now being implemented word for word by the current Government. The first progress report, which I tried to raise on the Adjournment today, refers to pension and redundancy costs, which would have the effect of offsetting many of the savings made. It would be worthwhile to have the Minister for public expenditure and reform come before the House to discuss the progress made, the challenges ahead and to give us the exact figures.

We had a very good debate last week on the Finance (No.2) Bill 2011 and the Minister of State, Deputy Brian Hayes, was very engaging. However, we were promised that the Minister, Deputy Michael Noonan, would take the debate. I acknowledge that he was busy doing very important work at the time, but it was promised that he would be there to discuss general matters of economic concern and I urge the Leader to try to arrange that debate. I understand the Minister for Finance has a very busy schedule. None of us would like to interfere with that in any way, but it is important to have a wide ranging debate on the economy and on the IMF.

Government spokespersons and Members of both Houses constantly quote the IMF report, even though some of them have not read it. Several Dáil Deputies admitted to me that they did not know much about it, but I told them it was only a short document. I urge people to read it in advance of any debate and to stop using the document to justify reductions in gardaí, cuts to SNAs and so on, because these things are not mentioned in the IMF deal. They were Government decisions that are within the sovereignty and the economic competence of this State. It is about time the Government started taking responsibility for those matters. They could be cleared up if the Leader agreed to a debate with the Minister for Finance. He has been here before, and I would be grateful if he came to the House again.

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