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ENVIRONMENT MINISTER PHIL Hogan has defended his handling of the Irish Water controversy as he today faced calls to resign over the new State utility company’s €86 million spending on consultants, contractors and legal services.
Speaking to reporters this morning, Hogan repeated that he cannot and does not “micromanage” Irish Water and said that it has sufficient oversight from Oireachtas committees and the Commission for Energy Regulation.
“You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs,” he insisted when asked if it is a PR disaster, saying that the establishment of Irish Water will cost €180 million and will save €2 billion over the next eight years.
He said that Irish Water and its chief executive John Tierney’s explanations of the spending to TDs and Senators on the Oireachtas Environment Committee yesterday were “very good ones”.
“You cannot set up a new utility on fresh air,” he said. “And the people that are actually being critical of setting up a new entity will have to examine and tell the Irish people what cuts in expenditure and what increases in taxation that they were prepared to bring in in order to ensure that we have good quality water and good quantities of water in the years ahead.”
He said that while he was not aware of the specific €86 million spend on external services, but said he “certainly knew” about the €180 million cost of setting up Irish Water.
Asked about staff at the new utility being paid bonuses he said this is a matter for Irish Water and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform.
“[They are] people that actually decide public pay policy so the board of Irish Water were in negotiations and have resolved those issues based on the contracts that were offered to people at the time,” he said.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin’s Gerry Adams today called on Hogan to resign as minister saying that the government should abandon the “debacle” of water charges.
“He’s been involved in too many debacles,” Adams said.
Fianna Fáil stopped short of saying Hogan should go. The party’s environment spokesperson, Barry Cowen, said the minister is “sleepwalking his way into no confidence territory” saying his omelette and eggs reference was “ridiculous”.
The party is tabling a private members’ motion in the Dáil tonight which calls for Irish Water to be opened up to scrutiny under Freedom of Information, a change the government is willing and likely to implement, though Fianna Fáil says it should happen immediately.
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Wonderful news! Common sense prevails. Rare but very very welcome.
This is great. If the kids with down Syndrome receive and are given the opportunity of a decent education then they will be fairly independent in later life.
They can hold down jobs and live a full and contribute to society.
Unfortunately the journal are jumping the gun on this one,while the bill will go uncontested,Minister Quinn have pulled the rug from under our feet,his new ‘special needs’ plan will precede all the that Finian McGrath has worked for and our kids will be at the bottom of the pile again,
cheers Ruairi,karma will win this one,I have no doubt!!!!
Seriously Nichola? That is a horrible thing for government to do.
That’s a start lets wait and see what Quinn has in store though. It would be really lovely if we as parents didn’t have to meet with the department inspectors to argue the case for keeping our child’s special needs assistant too.
Some good news :)
While this is very good news for children with Down’s syndrome and welcome, why is this only being offered to children with this specific diagnosis? There are many children who do not have an SNA or adequate resource hours at school because they “only” have mild intellectual disability.
The only reason for it coming up it is due to the very hard work of a group of parents and Down Syndrome Ireland supporters .
If this comes to into place then it points the way to all other interested groups. Everybody wants what’s best for every child no matter what their needs are.
The reason this is aimed at children with Down Syndrome was because Down Syndrome was not classified as a low incident disability and so resource hours were not guaranteed. This has now changed. Psychological assessments are used also in order to allocated resource hours presently. It’s true that you need a lobby group to enforce change but there are lots of groups out there who include all disabilities who could lobby on behalf of other children.
I am totally in favour of any resources being made available for people with disabilities but surely it would make more sense to provide resources to people depending on their level of intellectual disability rather than what disability they have i.e down syndrome. What about every other child who are born in this country with an intellectual disability that is an unknown syndrome or disorder. Surely more resources should be made available for them too. They should be passing a bill for mainstream schooling for people with mild to moderate intellectual disabilities, so every child is giving the chance not just down syndrome specific
Great news for those waiting for many years BUT ELECTION IS ON ITS WAY,,,
have your say