Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will move on from that but I want to put on the record of the House my disgust and that of my party with that sentence. I call for a debate on an independent sentencing committee. My colleague in the Dáil, Deputy Niall Collins, and Councillor Jim O'Callaghan have prepared a Bill that would establish an independent sentencing committee to which cases such as this could be referred. Guidelines have been set down in many areas and judges have guidelines for sentencing. In cases such as this, however, in which it is patently obvious that the sentence or judgment handed down was not correct or in which people are questioning a sentence, an independent sentencing commission could be established. Sentencing in general, rather than the specific case, should be discussed here with the Minister for Justice and Equality.

Where stands the Minister for Health's yellow-pack nurses scheme? I was horrified to read his comments in The Sunday Business Post in which he stated that should 1,000 graduate nurses not take up places at salaries that are 20% lower than those of their counterparts, they could emigrate or, in his own words, prop up counters in fast-food restaurants across the country.

That type of flippant, glib remark is completely out of place for the office he holds. I support the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation in its campaign to advise graduate nurses not to take up placements under this scheme where they will be paid 20% less for doing the same amount of work done by colleagues already in place. The merits or otherwise of the scheme must be debated in the Seanad, particularly given that the Minister, Deputy Reilly, wants to expand it into other areas such as physiotherapy and occupational therapy.