John McGuinness
Carlow-Kilkenny · Fianna Fáil · Ireland
“That concludes our business for this morning. I thank all the Members, the staff, the press and everyone involved in the House for their co-operation during the term. I want to acknowledge the fact that we had Cara Darmody in the Public Gallery this morning. I omitted to mention that. I wish her well in the campaign and in her efforts.”
“For the information of Members, the Poole family are in the Public Gallery. The Ceann Comhairle has already extended a welcome to the family, but I want to bring it to the attention of the Chamber, now that there are so many of us here, that they are here. They have achieved a lot. I acknowledge their presence.”
“Letting time pass to build up evidence for a case is having horrific impacts on women. I do not know when it began to escalate, but it is now the situation that the sexual, physical and financial abuse of women is out of control.”
“I join the Ceann Comhairle in extending the welcome to you. You have come through a harrowing journey to this day and you have exposed the State, as has been recorded by the Taoiseach, the Minister and others, in terms of the most awful failings, which have had terrible consequences on your lives and the lives of your families.”
“There are support services, but we need to fund them more extensively. The refuge centres serve a great purpose, but they need to connect more directly with local councils to ensure that whatever housing is needed is delivered.”
“I commend the Minister on bringing forward this stand-alone legislation. It is important that he continue his work reforming the various aspects of legislation that need to be examined and updated in the context of what society faces today.”
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“The vulture funds are quite impatient when dealing with families like that. In a debate yesterday, I referred to SOS Kilkenny. It is providing houses built for the purpose of housing disabled people. Everything is in those houses and it gives people independent living. The houses are there, but the HSE, which is a reactive rather than proactive organisation, is not providing the names of those who need to be housed in an emergency situation, or indeed a planned situation for life, to SOS to have them housed. That is despicable. Marginalised people, including those who are disabled, should be first to be looked after. The housing authority and in this case the HSE should be forced into action. The section that deals with these houses and the funding of them within the Minister’s Department is quite good. It is excellent.”
“We must ask each council how many people on the list want to downsize or upsize and ask it why it is not purchasing four- and five-bedroom houses. Councils leave people without any hope whatsoever in a very small house and have no plan for them to move on in future. There is an issue with the mortgage to rent scheme and getting the final decisions and letters from councils. I speak from experience with my council and my experience with vulture funds, which have no heart whatsoever, no compassion and no humanity. They just want their money. Where a young lady with cancer or a family trying to redeem themselves after the crash are looking to the mortgage to rent scheme and it has worked to the point where the local authority has been asked for that letter, either they do not get it or they will wait months.”
“We must ask what the County and City Management Association is doing. What obligations are on it to deliver on the numbers, whether through agencies or directly through the council? What will the Government do to make the association live up to the targets it should be achieving? In terms of transfers, I have seen people trying to upsize and downsize, elderly people who want to move to a much smaller house because of the cost of maintaining a three-bedroom house, but who cannot get the transfer, not because the houses to downsize or upsize are not there but because the Department puts the onus on local councils to carry out the repairs and to bear the cost of those repairs. We must ask each council how many houses are vacant in its area and what is it doing about it.”
“I wish the Minister and the Minister of State well in their work. It is a hugely important area and they are going to need all of the breaks and support that they can get in this House and in councils. When I think of local authority housing, I think of the question I am often asked, which is: why, in the 1950s, were we able to build so many well-structured houses for people who were able to avail of them from the housing list? There was a tenant purchase scheme to allow them to move on in their lives, buy the property and rear a family in it. I was reared in a three-bed local authority house and there were nine of us in that home. We have in recent years built a bureaucratic nightmare that is getting in the way of proper housebuilding. The Government must look at that and take out those blockages.”
“Deputy Fionntán Ó Súilleabháin - To discuss the condition of rural roads following recent bad weather. Deputy James Geoghegan - To discuss the alarming incidents of "sex for rent". The matters raised by Deputies Donna McGettigan, Michael Murphy, Liam Quaide and Conor Sheehan have been selected for discussion”
“Deputy Donna McGettigan - To discuss the acute lack of beds for anorexia patients in the mid-west region. Deputy Mattie McGrath - To discuss the need for a task force for Clonmel town. Deputy Danny Healy-Rae - To discuss the treatment plant system for the Aghadoe area, Killarney. Deputy Conor Sheehan - To discuss the absence of a consistent speech and language therapy service in King's Island primary care centre, Limerick. Deputies David Cullinane and Conor D. McGuinness - To discuss a date for the publication of the report of the review of specialist cardiac services. Deputy Liam Quaide - To discuss the need for special schools in east Cork. Deputies Gary Gannon and Marie Sherlock - To discuss the exclusion of mainstream classes in Holy Child preschool, Seán MacDermott Street, Dublin 1, from special educational needs support.”
“I wish to advise the House of the following matters in respect of which notice has been given under Standing Order 39 and the name of the Member in each case: Deputy Joanna Byrne - To discuss unsafe working conditions in the ambulance station in Drogheda. Deputy Séamus McGrath - To discuss Garda resources and station opening hours in south Cork city. Deputy Shane Moynihan - To discuss the need for a secondary school for Newcastle. Deputy John Connolly - To discuss the transition to the new provider of Irish Coast Guard search and rescue aviation services. Deputy Michael Murphy - To discuss the possibility of National Ambulance Service managers being subject to benefit-in-kind tax. Deputy Alan Kelly - To discuss the potential pedestrianistion of the old Ballina-Killaloe bridge.”
“There is a house in The Sycamores in Kilkenny prepared and ready for respite, run by Kilkenny SOS. As yet, there is no agreement on how that might proceed. There is a huge problem here. I wish the Minister well in what she is doing. It is a job in which she can introduce much reform that would benefit everyone. I urge her to do it sooner rather than later.”
“I ask for an intervention that would bring together housing, the HSE and the disability sector with a budget and a decision-making role so that with those initiatives that are being taken, the group could make an allocation of money and could make a decision on what is being asked for, and could take the word of the service providers, which are at their wits' end because of what is going on and because of the delays in question. It appears that the HSE is almost afraid to make a decision on the staffing of some of these homes and that has to change. Whatever our grand plan for the future is, it will be impossible to implement it if all of the actors representing the State do not come together and deliver to those service providers that are recognised and are doing the job properly.”
“I want to raise the issue that is central to this problem, which is the bureaucracy of the three sectors: the HSE, the disability sector and housing. That is preventing initiatives from being taken and preventing staff from being employed. Kilkenny SOS provides a fantastic service. It is at the cutting edge of developments in this area. It has been left short €500,000 since 2013-14. It was given its figure for 2025 and it is forecast to be short by €1.5 million by the end of the year. Kilkenny SOS cannot get the HSE to proactively work with it because even though it is proactive, the HSE seems to be just reactive. It is not giving the priority 1 and priority 2 cases to this organisation to allow them to take up independent living in their own houses.”
“I allowed Deputy Whitmore to make that contribution as I did not want to get into any argument about it at this stage but I would like to stick to what is on the agenda, which is agrifood. You have made your point but in the future whatever is on the agenda is what the Minister has prepared for, and that is what we are dealing with.”
“Deputy Ó Snodaigh and I had a great chat downstairs at the count, a very friendly conversation. I understand full well what he means about the Irish language. It is great to have that sort of camaraderie here where, even after a vote like this, we can all get together and do the business of the House. I should thank the Opposition, particularly all the Sinn Féin guys who came to me and said, “Don’t worry, John. We gave you number two.” We are all familiar with the story at the doorsteps where we are told, “I gave you a stroke.” Thank you all very much. Thank you, Ceann Comhairle.”
“I was elected to Kilkenny Corporation in 1979 and it took me 15 years to convince them to elect me as Mayor of Kilkenny City. I was elected here in 1997 and it has taken me this length of time to convince you to elect me as Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I am really proud of the fact that I have been elected by the Members. It is a great privilege and an honour. It is a job that, as I said, I will do to the very best of my ability and in a very impartial way. I want to conclude by thanking my family who are in the Gallery because without them, you do not succeed. They have been with me since my first election in 1979. In fact, I got elected in 1979 and then immediately got married afterwards, and both have endured. I do not know how Margaret has endured, but anyway.”
“May I take the opportunity to thank everyone for their support today in the election of Leas-Cheann Comhairle? I look forward to doing my job, as Leas-Cheann Comhairle, with plenty of support from the Ceann Comhairle, and with Members’ support, I will be able to fulfil this part of the declaration – maintain order and uphold the rights and privileges of Members. As I did this morning, I would appeal to you all for respect for each other in this House, respect for the Ceann Comhairle and for me, who, after all, are just doing what we are elected to do, which is to keep order. I think that we would make a far better contribution and give more time to Members if we were to use that time wisely without rancour or argument. I will finish by saying I am not an overnight success.”
“It clearly states in Standing Orders that the language is English and Irish, and while I may not be a fluent Gaeilgeoir, I can tell Members I have a great love for the Irish language and will use it occasionally as best I can. I would say to all of the Members here that there is no embarrassment about not being able to speak the Irish language fluently and we should try it every time we get the opportunity. To be respectful to everyone, however, if you do say something in Irish in the middle of a heated debate, it might be no harm if you repeated it in English thereafter. It might avoid a lot of work on committees and debate in this House.”
“That goes for Government as well, because I have often seen arguments start because of a lack of direct information coming from Government in terms of parliamentary questions and in terms of response times for the agencies of the State as they respond to the queries of Members as put forward in this House through written or oral parliamentary questions. I have seen great debates in this House where lots has been said and yet some of the key points made by Opposition and by Government backbenchers have not been included in the policy or legislation that was being discussed. If we are all equal, if we all recognise and are respectful of each other and know the job, we have to do, I believe that we can bring about the type of reform that is absolutely necessary as we move into a different world.”
“As they look in at the debates in the Dáil, we have to use those debates and the various events in the course of our time here in Leinster House to instil confidence in the public. I would say to Members that there is a need for all of us to be respectful of each other and of what we say here in the Dáil and to ensure we do not insult one another and, thereby, send out wrong messages, nor indeed misbehave to the extent that people lose faith in democracy itself. To do that, I would say to Members that all of us have the time to contribute. All of us are equal here in this House and we should all be listened to.”
“Of course, this Chamber has an obligation to ensure the Government lives up to its first obligation, which is to keep its people safe. All of this has a lot to do with the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, the Ceann Comhairle and the different cathaoirligh who are there to support the Ceann Comhairle in her role because all of these issues need to be debated in a constructive way in this House. All of the Members deserve the right to have the time to have the necessary forum available to them to bring forward their own views and to bring forward what is of concern to them and their constituents. The rights of Members must be defended all of the time. We must always consider those whom we represent in terms of priority to them.”
“I believe disruptors in the system are necessary because we cannot become complacent in the work we do on behalf of the people who elect us. Along with reform, that has been the cornerstone of my contribution to public life, always with an emphasis on public service. That is necessary for all of us to understand. This Dáil has a serious obligation and responsibility because of the changes that are taking place in the world to bring forward the reforms that are necessary and to put in place the type of Administration that will best deliver to the people whom all of us represent. It needs to deliver on value for money, supporting front-line workers, gardaí and the Army, and making sure that the marginalised, the sick and the elderly are central to all of what we do.”
“First, I congratulate the Ceann Comhairle on her election. I have not spoken in the Chamber since then. While I was a candidate in that election, she was the chosen one and I wish her well in her term of office. I want to thank the people of Carlow-Kilkenny for giving me the opportunity to represent them here once again and the fact that they gave me such a strong mandate. To all those who signed my nomination paper, and my own party, Fianna Fáil, I thank them for that support. I look forward to the contest here today. I wish to avail of the few minutes we have to put before the House some of the things that I stand for and have stood for since my first election to local government in 1979 and, thereafter, my election to the Dáil in 1997. I believe the status quo has to be challenged at all times for the better.”