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Updated 12.45pm
EDUCATION MINISTER RUAIRÍ Quinn has said that Rehab board member and Fine Gael strategist Frank Flannery would have spoken to him about concerns regarding State funding to the charity for its lottery scheme “but not in any kind of lobbying way”.
Quinn also told RTÉ Radio this morning that he would see Flannery walk past the ministerial offices in Government Buildings “the odd time with usually Fine Gael advisors” before Cabinet meetings on a Tuesday.
“I would be in there at, say, 8.30 in the morning on the day of a Cabinet meeting and I would meet him or I would see him walking past the odd time with usually Fine Gael advisors, and I would have greeted him,” he told Keelin Shanley on Today with Seán O’Rourke this morning.
Quinn would not be drawn on Flannery’s position as a strategist for Fine Gael saying that was a matter for the party and noting that Flannery had been active in politics “for as long as I remember”.
“I don’t know all the facts. I understand he has been invited to the Public Accounts Committee,” he added, noting that all charities in receipt of State funding – Rehab got some €82 million last year – have to be answerable to the PAC as the public spending watchdog.
Earlier, Kathleen Lynch, a Labour party minister, was speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland when she said that her “personal opinion” was that Flannery’s position is untenable though it’s unclear whether she was referring specifically to his membership of the Rehab board or his position in Fine Gael.
Flannery, a former CEO of the Rehab Group, has come under pressure in recent days in the wake of a story in the Irish Times which said he was paid thousands of euro by Rehab to lobby government departments in 2011 and 2012.
He has been called to appear before the Public Accounts Committee to answer questions about his membership of the Rehab board, his consultancy work for the disability organisation and his pension arrangements.
He was reportedly seen in Leinster House as the charity’s current CEO Angela Kerins and other Rehab executives were giving evidence at the PAC last week. A report in the Irish Independent this morning suggests he may now quit the board of Rehab.
When asked if his position is untenable, Lynch said: “I suppose you are asking me a personal opinion and in my personal opinion then it’s not.
“But that’s very much is a decision which Mr Flannery has to make for himself and indeed which Fine Gael has to make in relation to their relationship with him.”
First published 9.27am
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But if Apple developed a car would it have windows??!
Windows would be called i-screens
Hope they use those Tesla engineers to create a phone battery that lasts more than 8 hours first.
I recently got two full days from my iPhone 6′s battery.
It was turned off
I hope they don’t use apple maps
Use your iphone to open your car,
Great, so now when someone robs your phone they get your car too…..
How do you “rob” a phone? Cut it open and steal the components?
I’ll get your coat Jake.
As long as you don’t rob it. There is stuff in the pockets!
We should never invent anything new in case it gets stolen.
Someone stole the Internet once.
People will steal anything.
“They” steal everything that’s not nailed down, and if it’s nailed down, “they” steal the nails as well
If Google make their own car they could call it Google Drive…
;D
They could make it a van and stuff it full of documents.
That wasn’t funny. Had to thumb it down myself.
Well at least you had the good sense to thumb it down.
OMG… What a dreadful thought. I honestly can’t think of anything worse for more reasons than I can express. I can see Apple suing Ford for also having a vehicle with a wheel at each corner and Toyota for having Glass in the windows… And can you imagine an iCar that will only let you drive it to where Apple thinks you should go, only lets you put Apple fuel in it, and force feeds you scrappy U2 music at random… And don’t even get get me started on the truly woeful navigation system it will all run on…. We’re doomed.
fantastic company
Used to be but as they discovered before. No jobs no chance
The iCar chooses your destination for you from a list of Apple-approved destinations…
Someone should tell apple it is illegal to touch your phone whilst driving.
So on one hand we have a company that released all of its patents in order to facilitate the development of this technology, and on the other we have a company that aggressively buys up patent holding companies in order to bring massive lawsuits against its competitors in order the tighten it’s stranglehold on the market. Oh yeah. Super news…
the begrudgary here is top notch.
I was at the launch of the original iPod in ireland and listened to a lot of people in the room laugh afterwards and saying that apple shouldn’t get involved in the personal entertainment business etc. I can’t say that I was overly impressed with the iPod originally but it has changed the playing field massively.
but anyway ..the same predictable jokes about apple / android / samsung / microsoft must just get funnier the more the same people post them on every tech related story.
The Floor count of the United Nations Building.
Let them waste millions on the driverless cars.
Stupid idea. Literally accidents waiting to happen. Then they get sued.
Be better off focusing on jet packs instead.
Well I hope they don’t allow the car version of the OS to get as bloated and slow as iOS after each release.
Very frustrating on an iPad, but a potentially lethal irritation in a car.
Apple using Tesla people to try out their software in cars. Only a matter of time before they do “iCars”. Before iPhone they tested out iTunes on Motorola phones and that was a success , hence iPhone.
have your say