Today's business is items 1, 2 and 3 and there will be an additional item on a supplementary Order Paper which will be circulated later. Item 1, statements on Northern Ireland, will be taken from now until 1 p.m. with 15 minutes per speaker and the Tánaiste will speak during the course of the debate, not at the beginning. There will be a sos from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. Item 2 will be taken from 2 p.m. until 4 p.m. and item 3 from 4 p.m. until 4.30 p.m. There is an error in the Order Paper. The name of Senator Sherlock should also be attached to that motion and I will arrange for that to be done. The arrangements for this item will follow the same pattern as last week. There will be short statements of not more than four minutes per person. That item will conclude at 4.30 p.m. and then there will be a motion to establish a tribunal of inquiry into the Dunnes Stores payments. The terms of reference of that tribunal will be circulated later in the day. I suggest that the debate should last one hour, as will be the case in the other House, from 4.30 p.m. to 5.30 p.m. with not more than ten minutes per speaker.
Order of Business.
I thank the Leader for item 3 which is very relevant. Progress has been made in the last 24 hours. The fact that we are in a position to debate this issue, which is of real importance, bears out what was said yesterday during the debate on the reform of the Seanad.
How does the Leader intend to circulate the wording of and other matters relating to the item which will be on the supplementary Order Paper?
It will have been noticed and we, on this side of the House, are pleased that the European Commission has taken on board an issue raised by the Fianna Fáil Party last year in Private Members' Time which is the televising of national sporting events. The Commission is at last coming to grips with the idea of one individual taking over the worldwide rights to the televising of sporting events and we welcome that. It is interesting to note that the statistics given were ones we mentioned last year. How could RTÉ or any other national station compete with the Murdoch group when it reports £130 million six month profits and offers substantial amounts of money for the television rights to sporting events? We would welcome the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht and the Government responding in a positive way to the Commission's lead and seeking support for its efforts to ensure that the televising of national sporting events are not handed over to a single individual.
As the appalling vista of a nurses' strike next week comes ever nearer, are the Leader and the Government happy that agreements on emergency services which have been agreed at national level are now in place and ready for operation at local level should this unfortunate strike happen next week?
We agree with the Order of Business. Like Senator Wright, I am glad the Leader has tabled the motion on Sellafield. It is essential that the objections and concerns of this House are made known publicly and especially to those within the United Kingdom involved in this project.
I agreed with the Order of Business and welcome item 3 on the Order Paper. Will the Leader confirm in relation to items 3 and 4 that we will have an opportunity of speaking? Time is short and numbers may not allow us to speak within such a short time.
Senator Wright spoke about the impending nurses' dispute. As this is the last sitting day before the strike takes place, I ask the Leader to exhort the Minister for Health, Deputy Noonan, to pull out all the stops in an effort to avert this strike which will have a catastrophic effect on the health services.
I gave notice to raise a matter on the Adjournment but I have not been fortunate in getting it raised either yesterday or today. The situation has changed since and I ask the Leader to exhort the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications, Deputy Dukes, to state whether or not the midlands peat station will go ahead and to ensure all efforts are being made in his Department to that end. There seems to have been a tardiness in the Department which has led to today's situation. Doubt has been cast over it becoming a reality and that would be most unfortunate for the entire midlands region.
I welcome a report published by the Department of Finance on the review of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. I ask the Leader, therefore, for a short debate to allow us to bring into the public arena what actually goes on in the DPP's Office. I welcome the fact that the office is willing to publish a report for the first time in 1997, because one of the points made in the Department of Finance report is that the public has a poor knowledge and understanding of the workings of the Office. In two cases which came to my attention as a public representative members of the public had been at a loss to know the reason for a particular decision and have felt undue influence had been put on the Office to avert the course of justice. Therefore, it is important that this issue is raised in the public arena.
First, I ask the Leader when we can have a substantive debate on the prison service and its associated problems? Many people have been disturbed over the past number of months and years because of what has been happening in the prison service. This has been brought home to a bigger audience over the past couple of weeks because of the two television programmes from "The Joy" which were more than disturbing. I am not sure whether this should be raised on the Adjournment but it would be better if there was a substantive debate on our approach to prison reform and the attitude of society towards people.
The matter was brought home to people not only during the week after "The Joy" was broadcast but when a person who was fined £39,000 for an offence involving angledust opted for prison rather than pay the fine. What will happen is that he will go to prison for a week or two and he will not have to pay the fine. This was a case where the judge felt he was worse than a drug dealer. It is a disgrace that there are such situations. There is a dichotomy between my first point and this one about the farmer. In the latter case, it is the same as if I was in business, somebody did not pay his debt to me, he opted for prison and, by doing so, eliminated the debt.
I ask the Senator to put a question?
Can we have a substantive debate on the prison service and related matters?
Second, I ask the Leader to ask the Minister for the Environment to ban bull-bars from all four wheel drive vehicles. A substantial number of people are buying four wheel drive vehicles at present and they all have bull-bars in front. Some of them have been involved in accidents but these bull-bars were only designed for off-road use. If one is driving at night, these bull-bars obscure the vehicles front lights.
Has the Senator a question for the Leader?
These vehicles are higher on the road than normal cars. If one is driving on the Naas Road at night, they come up behind at 70 miles per hour and the driver knows that one must pull over because they have bull-bars. Their drivers are aggressive in their attitude. Will the Leader ask the Leader to ask the Minister for the Environment to ban bull-bars on any vehicle unless it is being used on the farm, which was the purpose for which they were designed originally.
I ask the Leader for a debate on health insurance because yesterday's newspapers stated that VHI subscribers could face paying for operations in hospitals. Such headlines are becoming too frequent. They appear every two or three months. We should have a debate on the matter because when the VHI was set up the annual premium was fixed and one heard no more about it until the following year.
B'fhéidir go mba chóir go mbeadh an freagra ar an cheist seo ar eolas agam cheana Féin. Does the Leader know if a deadline has been set by the Minister for Education for the report of the committee she has established to inquire into the status of institutions in the regional technical college sector, which, as he knows, is a matter of great concern to all of us involved in higher education. I am not going to make a speech on the matter but the degree of dismay, confusion and uncertainty which has been caused by the way things have been handled recently is most unfortunate. The sooner there can be clear headlines for decisions, the better for everybody concerned.
I join Senator Lee in his request for a report on the regional technical colleges. There is great dismay and anger in the community at present. Some people feel Waterford regional technical college was chosen without proper investigation. That report is needed as it will bring balance to the debate and help progress the situation of regional technical colleges in third level education.
I also join in the call for the intervention of the Minister for Health in the impending nurses' strike. I appreciate and agree with Senator Wright that emergency services must be provided and the Minister must satisfy himself that that will be the case. I also ask that the Minister would use his good offices over the weekend even at the eleventh hour to have this strike averted. I know from my clinics that there is great worry in the community about this and the Minister owes it to the public, particularly at a time when the fallout from the Christmas flu is still apparent, to intervene to try to resolve this matter. I ask the Leader to take to the Minister for Health the call from this House that he intervene personally in this dispute to avert this strike.
I rise to fulfil a promise I made to several nurses, not just in my area but throughout the country, who called or wrote to me in the past week. This has been quite unprecedented in my experience. I join with my colleague, Senator Finneran, who has put it so well but I extend that request to the Leader because, as far as I can ascertain, nurses are not just angry and confused, but feel isolated and marginalised from this political system of which we are so proud and privileged to serve.
I ask the Senator to put a question? We are not debating this matter on the Order of Business.
I want to put the reason for this anger in context and convey the strength of feeling among ordinary nurses who feel victims of the system when in the past couple of weeks they have seen a public service increase of staggering proportions under the Partnership 2000. As somebody said to me yesterday, this increase has come to people who are doing nothing other than just turning up for work for the next three years. There is no return and yet the nurses are being put in a position of having to give up many of the things which are attributed to their particular work. All I wish to do is join with others in this House. We would be failing in our duty as politicians if we did not convey the strong sense of outrage, confusion, and particularly isolation from the political system, which nurses feel at this time. I join Senator Finneran in strongly urging the Leader to convey the strength of feeling to the Minister for Health. The buck stops with the Minister for Health. Ultimately, he must make decisions and I pray those decisions will be made within the next couple of days.
I support my colleague's call for an urgent debate on the prison system. I believe I speak for everyone when I say that many people feel the prison system is falling into disrepute. It is a sad day when approximately 20 prisoners are being released from Mountjoy Prison each day. Obviously, this crisis — there is no political point to be made here — did not arise overnight. The Garda, those involved in prosecutions and judges feel frustrated when they see those who have gone through the system and who have been convicted back on the streets in a matter of days or weeks. The Minister for Justice said legislation on the organisation of the prison service was forthcoming. At what stage is that legislation? I support Senator Lanigan's call for a debate on the reform of the prison system.
I wish the talks taking place to resolve the nurses' dispute success. However, I am gravely worried that those involved in the talks will not be capable of averting a strike mainly because those indirectly involved in this issue are not in discussion. I am concerned that health board managers must report back to the Department of Health. That is not the way this strike can be resolved. It is important that the Minister for Health become directly involved. I support Senator Wright and others who requested that an initiative be taken by the Minister to try to resolve this dispute and avoid the virtual closure of hospitals next Monday. Recently, the Taoiseach indicated in a constructive speech that this dispute should and must be resolved.
I ask the Leader to contact the Taoiseach, the Minister for Health and, indeed, the Minister for Finance, who has the biggest responsibility in resolving this issue, to ask them to become directly involved. Welcome and all as the discussions are, they are not in a position to bring about a resolution of this matter because it is a third party type of arrangement where reports must be made to the Department each afternoon after the discussions. It is important that the Leader discuss this with the Minister for Health and, if necessary, with the Taoiseach, to see what action the Government is taking to resolve this matter before it gets out of hand next week.
On the point raised by Senator Wright, the text of the motion will be circulated by way of Supplementary Order Paper to all Members this morning. I agree with the Senator on the undesirability of any group having a monopoly on major sporting events. We had a useful debate on this last year when Senator Mooney and others raised that issue. I would be happy to have such a debate again in the near future.
Senator Honan asked if she could contribute to this afternoon's debates. That is not a matter for me but for the Cathaoirleach. However, I am sure it would be the wish of the House that Senator Honan be heard on both these issues and be accommodated. Senator Wright, Senator Honan and others raised the nurses' strike. I will convey the record of what was said on today's Order of Business to the Minister for Health. Every effort is and will continue to be made to avert a strike which nobody wants and is in nobody's interest. At this stage all we can do is give those who are trying to avert that strike our full support.
Senator Honan raised the issue of the peat station. I, and I know she did yesterday, conveyed her concerns to the Minister. He will be in a position to come to the House to discuss the matter in the near future.
Senator Kelly raised an interesting point on the role of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Her point was valid in that there is a lack of public knowledge on what such offices do. There may be a great deal of ignorance and misunderstanding as a result. I am not sure if a debate would help that matter. It may be that such offices must become more proactive in explaining to the public what they do. However, it is a valid point which I will bear in mind.
Senator Lanigan and Senator Mulcahy raised the question of the prison service. The Department of Justice will produce two major Bills in the coming weeks and these issues can be raised in that context. However, if the Senators feel there is a need for a specific debate on the prison service, I will arrange one later in the session. Senator Lanigan raised the question of bull-bars and I will convey his concern to the Minister for the Environment. Senator Calnan again called for a debate on health insurance. It is important that we have such a debate and I will see if one can be arranged. Senator Lee and Senator Finneran raised the question of a deadline on the committee inquiring into the future status of regional technical colleges. I have no information on that but I will get some.