Anger at €5,900 jet bill for Dáil vote

Dannyboy83

By Paul O’Brien, Political Correspondent
Friday, March 26, 2010

THE use of the Government jet to fly home a junior minister for the vote on the Cabinet reshuffle has been criticised in the Dáil.

The Irish Examiner revealed yesterday how the Government frantically dispatched the jet to collect Trade Minister Billy Kelleher from London when it feared it did not have enough votes to approve the reshuffle.

The matter was raised in the Dáil yesterday by Labour leader Eamon Gilmore, who criticised the use of the jet for such purposes. "I cannot see how this could be construed as Government business," he said. "If Fianna Fáil wanted to fly him home, it should have paid the bill."

Mr Gilmore then quipped that the Government could have found a cheaper vote elsewhere. "The Government could buy an Independent (TD) for less."

Meanwhile, a spokesman for Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny has said the party will decide on future pairing requests on a "case-by-case basis". Pairing is the system whereby a minister, away on official business and unable to make it to the Dáil, is paired with a Fine Gael TD who then abstains from voting in the interests of fairness.

The Government says it dispatched the jet for Mr Kelleher because Fine Gael withdrew his pair at short notice on Tuesday morning.

The Fine Gael spokesman confirmed this was the case, and said the party wanted to put pressure on the Government now that its majority is shrinking. He said the Government would have to demonstrate that a minister was on crucial State business for a pairing request to be granted from now on.

The jet collected Mr Kelleher from London’s Heathrow Airport. He had arrived there on a commercial flight from Australia, where he had been on a state visit.

He was due to take another commercial flight from Heathrow to Dublin on Tuesday night.

But when the Government realised that flight would arrive in Dublin too late it dispatched the jet.

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Friday, March 26, 2010


Read more: http://www.examiner.ie/ireland/politics/anger-at-euro5900-jet-bill-for-dail-vote-115608.html#ixzz0jUcY8hfU

Hadn't seen this posted elsewhere and thought it was deserving of a mention.

How are we supposed to convince the Public Sector to agree to spending reforms when the government are unwilling to apply the same reforms?

Why were government funds used?
Should it not have been FF funds?

IrishTonyO

FF should pay the costs of this, or else make sure their TD's are available for votes

Hagar

Why can't they adopt the US "pairing" idea? If a member of the Govt is away on business and so is a member of the opposition they agree to "pair" ie neither come back to vote as both votes would cancel each other out. It saves time & travel plus whatever important work they were absent doing continues to get done.
No rocket science really.

IrishTonyO

69 wrote: »

Why can't they adopt the US "pairing" idea? If a member of the Govt is away on business and so is a member of the opposition they agree to "pair" ie neither come back to vote as both votes would cancel each other out. It saves time & travel plus whatever important work they were absent doing continues to get done.
No rocket science really.

They do that at the moment, but even with that they were afraid of losing the vote. Also now Fine Gael has said it will look at the pairing on a vote by vote basis from now on

Dannyboy83

69 wrote: »

Why can't they adopt the US "pairing" idea? If a member of the Govt is away on business and so is a member of the opposition they agree to "pair" ie neither come back to vote as both votes would cancel each other out. It saves time & travel plus whatever important work they were absent doing continues to get done.
No rocket science really.

They do that, but see the bit I highlighted in bold.

FG Spokesman said the Government would have to demonstrate that a minister was on crucial State business for a pairing request to be granted from now on.

That can only be a good thing imo.

danman

So, who decides if the state business is crucial?
FG?

I'm no fanboy of the government, but if the minister in question was away on state business, as he was, why did FG not use the pairing option?

FG cannot claim any sort of moral victory, or be outraged by this.
They refused to use to pairing option, so what did they expect FF to do?

I see this bill as being half FF's and half FG's.
Which is probably why it took the Labour leader to point it out.
I notice no mention from FG of being outraged.

raindog.promo

From http://news.eircom.net/national/17541206/

Mr Kelleher arrived in London Heathrow on Tuesday afternoon on a commercial flight from Australia, where he had represented the state for St Patrick's Day festivities and trade events.

He had been scheduled to fly home from Heathrow on another commercial carrier which would have seen him land in Dublin around 8pm.

But that meant he would have missed the vote, which took place around 6.15pm. As a result, the Government decided on Tuesday morning to dispatch the jet to Heathrow to collect him.

Patricks Day: 17th March
Daíl vote: 23rd March

Is he that incapable of planning ahead or just too used to lording it over the little people?

Fair play to FG. More of the same please. The government are servants of the people and I'm sick hearing of them taking the piss every single day.

jimmycrackcorm

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

How are we supposed to convince the Public Sector to agree to spending reforms when the government are unwilling to apply the same reforms?

Why were government funds used?
Should it not have been FF funds?

Why not FG/LAB etc agree to a pairing arrangement to save the taxpayer money? Of course politics is so petty....

raindog.promo

jimmycrackcorm wrote: »

Why not FG/LAB etc agree to a pairing arrangement to save the taxpayer money? Of course politics is so petty....

the Government would have to demonstrate that a minister was on crucial State business for a pairing request to be granted from now on.

danman

raindog.promo wrote: »

the Government would have to demonstrate that a minister was on crucial State business for a pairing request to be granted from now on.

So back to the question I posed earlier.

Who decides if government business is crucial?
FG?

The pairing system has worked for a long time. FG tried to pull a stroke, it backfired.
Did FG make any compliant about the usage of the jet?

No, because they realised that the stroked they pulled didn't work.

Pot Noodle =

Its a disgrace that is all