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ON MORNING IRELAND earlier Gerry Adams got into a slightly heated exchange with presenter Cathal MacCoille over how many houses he owns and whether he’ll have to pay water charges.
The Sinn Féin president claimed a week ago that he didn’t think he was liable for the controversial charges because he only had a family home in Belfast.
He later backtracked and said he would be paying the charges after we asked several Sinn Féin frontbenchers if they’d be paying their water bills. One of them said they’d be inclined not to.
So if Adams is now saying he’s going to pay his Irish Water bill it begs the question as to just how many houses he owns given he is from Belfast, has connections in Donegal and is a TD for Louth.
Here’s the exchange on Morning Ireland earlier:
Cathal MacCoille: Are you going to pay [water charges] on your houses?
Gerry Adams: Well, I don’t like the way you use the term ‘houses’…
MacCoille: Well you have more than one, correct?
Adams: Well, no I don’t have more than one. I have a house in Belfast belonging to my family and we, my family, has a holiday home in Donegal. But yes, I…
MacCoille: And you have a house in Louth?
Adams: No, I don’t have a house in Louth. I’ve never had a house in Louth… By the way this is all irrelevant…
MacCoille: Whether it’s two or three it doesn’t matter, the point is: Are you going to pay?
Adams: Well it isn’t true Cathal and you shouldn’t be…
MacCoille: Sorry, what’s not true?
Adams: I don’t have a house in Louth.
MacCoille: I didn’t say you have, I simply asked the question. The point is: Will you be paying?
Adams: Yes, I will be paying.
Clear?
So there’s a house in Belfast, which isn’t subject to the Irish Water regime, and a house in Donegal which presumably is.
This morning, a Sinn Féin spokesperson confirmed that Adams intended to pay water charges on the holiday house in Donegal.
Asked about Adams’s living arrangements in Louth, the spokesperson said that the local TD “stays with a friend” when he’s in his constituency.
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As a contrast, our newly appointed Taoiseach has frequently disputed the correlation between poverty and ill health and premature mortality. Despite the fact that Veradker is a qualified medical practitioner, his political ideology that poverty is not a concern of government, blinds him to the hugely detrimental impact of poverty on human health.
Diets in poorer area plays a bugger role in life expectancy….
@Paul: When we see that obesity if a factor in First World “poverty” we should wake up and see that PC fake analyse is keeping the poor, poor. Certain political parties need to keep a pool of poor people as voters to get themselves elected and these are the real enemies of the poor.
The private practice model of GP healthcare is not financially viable in poorer areas. Timely Access to GPs is more restricted in the case of poorer people than for those who are more comfortably off.
@Jenny mcCarty: You can qualify that statement, I assuming.
@Tony Daly: quiet the opposite. Workers have to arrange time off work to visit GP and pay 50 to 65€ as they don’t have medical cards.
@Geraoid O’Helidhe: Great, all workers should have them and the public housing close to jobs if required.
Well done for highlighting health inequalities. Not new but larger ignored in ireland.
See the Black Report – very old doc now
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2190/XXMM-JMQU-2A7Y-HX1E?journalCode=joha
Also this affects everyone to some degree as there is a social gradient.
It’s all about choices….
@Gavin Huban: To an extent it is but you have less choices to make or certain choices have a higher cost as a proportion of your income. To eat healthier might be very difficult to afford or even get depending on where you live.
Slightly off topic but one glaring indictment of our health service is that even for private patients, waiting times are only “a matter of month”.
In this country we have now a new norm of having to wait months even privately except where you are a Minister or politician.
@Ger Healy: I completely agree. There is something to be said for a competitive American model of medicine where doctors decide to help people, make money because of their qualifications and expertise, and not be grossly overworked. When I have had to see a specialist, after waiting a very long time for the appointment, I wonder about the waiting list of people behind me and how that must affect the health of the doctor being put under so much pressure day in and day out.
@Ger Healy: The narrative that people are definitely corrupt if they are politicians is wrong and threatens democracy and is similar to the widely held belief that all media are liars.
Put it this way…………………….have you ever seen a bookie riding a bicycle?Go figure!
@Jenny mcCarty: Have you ever asked yourself why you need these gross simplifications, Jenny? I pay a mortgage and work, but I acknowledge this as good fortune, as well as the work ethic and attitude I was lucky enough to inherit – in the long run I’m far better off in all respects. Stop whining – you may need to see the world in such simple terms because you are frightened by its complex problems and just want it to go away. For you and all of us it will, eventually, and this will have been your life – is this the best you can do?
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