Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

As a member of the Royal British Legion and former member of the Royal Irish Rangers and a colleague of the many who served in Her Majesty's forces who now live in the Republic of Ireland, I would like to express my sympathies on their behalf. Her Majesty when she visited Ireland won the hearts of the nation of Ireland in a few short words and she is indeed a sad loss. I ask also that the Government might consider allowing employees to take some time when the funeral of Her Majesty takes place. It may be something odd to say but our country has grown quite a lot in recent years and I think it would be a decent and honourable thing to do.

I have spoken on search and rescue services many times in this House. I am not going into the detail of it today but facts were released in recent days through The Sunday Business Post. I have had two Private Members' sessions here and on both occasions the Minister did not do the courtesy of answering the questions I asked. There is now clearly a prima faciecase for a conflict of interest in the establishment of the business case for our next search and rescue service. The people of Ireland are entitled to know why we are going to be paying somewhere between €1 billion and €1.5 billion for a contract for five helicopters in four bases while our brothers and sisters in the UK are getting 18 helicopters in 12 bases for €1.6 billion. I ask for time to have the Minister, the senior Minister, in here to discuss this matter and let us see where we are going with it.

The Cathaoirleach is aware of the fact that the report on our secretarial assistants' claim came out today. Quite frankly it is a good deal for those who have just joined the service but for those who have served us for many years it is a terrible deal. There is about €800 a year, at best, in it before tax for senior secretarial assistants. I know the Cathaoirleach sits on the commission. The author of this report clearly failed to understand the job of Seanad Éireann and in particular those who work for us within Seanad Éireann. I ask the Cathaoirleach in particular to ask that we go back to the drawing board on this issue. It is an appalling misunderstanding of the work. The Cathaoirleach's own secretarial assistant puts in a massive amount of work keeping all of us informed all the time. We need to better respect those who work for us.Giving new entrants a massive increase is great but it should have ricocheted up the line fully. I know that the woman who works for me is often down in my office at 9 o'clock and 10 o'clock at night finalising things for the following day. I ask all of my colleagues to join with me on this issue and support those who support us because we could not do the job we do without these people. They are not secretaries or administrators. They are researchers and they are support people. I could not operate without Jean in my office and I think that all of the rest of us are the same. I ask the Cathaoirleach to bring that to the committee and ask the Leader to write a letter to the commission to that effect.