David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Leas-Chathaoirleach for his elucidation, but what always happens inevitably is that it goes to the committee and then it comes back to this House and we rubber-stamp it. I wish to express my concern about this, because it would be useful for us to have a debate on the situation regarding the exchange of information and the eavesdropping on millions of telephone conversations. We should be very grateful to the whistleblowers involved. I hope to nominate them for the Nobel prize. As Members of Parliament, we all get the opportunity to nominate people for the Nobel peace prize. They have done more for peace than most people.

We hear much about people having difficulty buying schoolbooks because they cannot pass them from one generation to the next, as the schoolbooks change every year and so on. It has gone one stage further now, when many schools are using iPads for teaching purposes. I heard of a parent-teacher meeting at a particular school at which the father of a pupil was confronted by Bank of Ireland officials handing out leaflets offering loans at 14% to buy these iPads. It is rather unfair that parents should be jumped on in this precipitate manner, particularly when credit unions can offer them loans at 4%. There is a responsibility on schools, if they are going to make these demands on parents, at least to help them in the most positive way to get the lowest possible loans.

That all brings me to banks. It is about time we had another debate on banks and the banking system. Nothing has happened. The system and many of the people who were involved are still in place. I have great sympathy for bank staff, but every time I go into a bank there are fewer staff and more machines. That indicates that banks do not want any interpersonal interaction. That is bad for society and bad for banking, and it leads to bad decisions because we do not know the people involved.

I agree with my colleagues who have asked for the Minister for Health to come to this House, but it should not be just to discuss the national children's hospital. I am not at all antagonistic towards the Minister for Health. I think he is a most energetic Minister. I listened with interest to my colleague, Professor Crown, who should know, saying he was the best Minister for Health in his experience. I am not attacking him personally, but it is certainly very worrying when the CEOs of four major hospitals write to the HSE to state that because of the cutbacks imposed, patient safety is threatened. This is added to by another external influence, which is not party political. It is a mistake to make these things party political issues. The troika has expressed concern about the situation inside the Department of Health. It would be useful for us to have a debate on the issue in this House.