Harney gone....Thank God!!!!!!

Jimmyboss

Newstalk reporting that Mary Harney will NOT contest the General Election, and has apparently tendered her resignation from the Cabinet.........:D

RonMexico

Good riddance

hotmail.com

Has her resignation been accepted?

meemeep

that's been coming - more FF choreography

mystique150

Has the health system broken Mary Harney, or did Mary Harney break the health service?

Absurdum

the deck of cards (jokers) is well and truly collapsing around Cowen now

bitter

A truely stupid inept women was the Harney thing

later12

No surprise, ultimately I think that while she has her faults, she and her politics will be a loss.

People on here probably detest her, however i think a more balanced evaluation of her tenure in office will be a fairer reflection of her Ministerial abilities and her policies. Although she had her faults, she was easily a better Minister than most others we have had recently or are likely to have in the near future.

Avns1s

She has been quoted as saying that she sought the Health portfolio in 2004 as a "challenge". Well Mary, you sure as hell weren't up to it just as you weren't up to the Enterprise Trade and Employment Portfolio before that.

She would rank as one of the most over-rated Ministers of all in my opinion.

raymon

Good riddance - you did nothing for our health services .

Shazanne

I understood that it was never Mary Harney's intention to contest the next Election and that she made that known a couple of years ago.
Still good news to hear it again;)

beertons

Brilliant news. Between herself and Michael Martin, the country is better off without them. Between the two of them, they did nothing but close ward after ward after ward.

PeterIanStaker

Good riddance Mary, enjoy the pensions and the liver transplant.

Laminations

Woohoo!!!

juuge

The problem now is that even more gob$hites will be promoted to both ministerial and junior ministerial posts. God help us all!:(

gj777

best news of 2011!!!

hallelujajordan

later10 wrote: »

No surprise, ultimately I think that while she has her faults, she and her politics will be a loss.

People on here probably detest her, however i think a more balanced evaluation of her tenure in office will be a fairer reflection of her Ministerial abilities and her policies. Although she had her faults, she was easily a better Minister than most others we have had recently or are likely to have in the near future.

No surprise that she is not contesting but why has she resigned from cabinet ?? ?

Dozen Wicked Words

gj777 wrote: »

best news of 2011!!!

Until the election result

ballsymchugh

there was a story on newstalk this evening that she was going to introduce legislation to penalise younger people who didn't take out health insurance for every year that they didn't, so that their first premium would be high, thereby forcing people to get health insurance and totally destroying any hope of a decent public health service.

thank Christ she can't fck it up anymore now.

sollar

She has so much to answer for.... she was awful for poor people in health and thank go she is going.

We needed a decent public system or a proper system run by way of health insurance. Not the crappy halfway system she over saw. Where half the young people in the country had no idea how bad the system was and didn't know they would be much safer with insurance. God she was terrible!!

Nodferatu

there's about 6 of these mary harney threads on the front page, i am delighted to heasr the news. the durrty cow.

leincar

She has finally eaten all the pies and has left the building.

later12

hallelujajordan wrote: »

No surprise that she is not contesting but why has she resigned from cabinet ?? ?

Apparently because she feels it inappropriate to serve in the cabinet if you will not be seeking a renewed mandate as a public representative.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0119/harneym.html

Minister for Health and Children Mary Harney has offered her resignation to the Taoiseach, after deciding not to contest the next General Election.
Ms Harney told RTÉ News this evening that she did not believe it was appropriate for someone who was not running in the election to continue to serve in Cabinet.
She said she had informed the Taoiseach of her decision last week, but that he asked her to hold off on the announcement.
Ms Harney said she assumed that her resignation would be accepted, and that as the Taoiseach already had to fill one vacancy at Cabinet, he would fill her position at the same time.
Asked if she expected further resignations of Ministers who are not contesting the election, she said that was a matter for the individuals concerned.
The former leader of the Progressive Democrats has served as Minister for Heath since 2004, as well as Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment.
Ms Harney, who served as Tánaiste to Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, was first elected to the Dáil in 1981.

PeterIanStaker

dooferoaks wrote: »

Until the election result

not necessarily, never underestimate the stupidity of the Irish electorate! :mad:

lugha

hallelujajordan wrote: »

No surprise that she is not contesting but why has she resigned from cabinet ?? ?

Yeah, that is strange. Surely there were ministers in the past who quit the Dail as ministers and felt no need to resign as ministers in advance?

ballsymchugh

later10 wrote: »

No surprise, ultimately I think that while she has her faults, she and her politics will be a loss.

People on here probably detest her, however i think a more balanced evaluation of her tenure in office will be a fairer reflection of her Ministerial abilities and her policies. Although she had her faults, she was easily a better Minister than most others we have had recently or are likely to have in the near future.

no she wasn't. her brief is to improve social health care. she did her best to destroy it and privatise it.

Fitzerb

beertons wrote: »

Brilliant news. Between herself and Michael Martin, the country is better off without them. Between the two of them, they did nothing but close ward after ward after ward.

But yet we have more open hospital beds more than 5 years ago.......... Thats Magic

Dozen Wicked Words

Fitzerb wrote: »

But yet we have more open hospital beds more than 5 years ago.......... Thats Magic

You don't happen to have the figures do you, would be interesting to see a link if possible. I suppose a lot of people go on anecdotal evidence from their local hospital, I know my local general has lost 50+ beds. Maybe your statistics are day beds?

sollar

later10 wrote: »

Although she had her faults, she was easily a better Minister than most others we have had recently or are likely to have in the near future.

I'll bet you had private health insurance.

Funkyzeit

ballsymchugh wrote: »

no she wasn't. her brief is to improve social health care. she did her best to destroy it and privatise it.

Not to mention her parties light touch regulation/closer to Boston policies which were a huge contributing factor to the boom/bust...

Good riddance and close the door on your way out....

hallelujajordan

later10 wrote: »

Apparently because she feels it inappropriate to serve in the cabinet if you will not be seeking a renewed mandate as a public representative.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0119/harneym.html

Thanks . .

That logic is daft though . . Why hand over your responsibilities for such a short period of time. . I know in my business it would take 6 months to handover such a pivotal role . . all she is doing is leaving us without an experienced health minister for 2 months !

10 years too late

lucozader

she tried to prove she was more than just a pretty face, by taking on the challenge of the health service, pity she failed

20Cent

Like someone else said best news of 2011 so far. The rats are leaving the sinking ship, roll on the election. This and Joe Higgins giving Barrosso a bollocking.

trishasaffron

Sorry to see her go. She tried to take on the vested interests in the health service - she had some success with consultants and pharmacists - more than anyone else.

Its all too easy to point to the failures of the system and blame the minister. Any time I heard a medic criticise her I reckoned she must be doing something right.

Fitzerb

I agree she has done little in this Government (3/4 years)

However I wont be jumping for joy if Reilly of FG gets it.

This is the Dr when president of the IMO threatened to charge patients an extra 5 Euro if the Department did not pay the doctors 10,000 they claimed they were due

http://www.rte.ie/news/2002/0405/doctors.html

ThisRegard

Do people honestly think that anyone, from any party, could have or will be able to do a better job when up against such a mess that is the HSE ? It needs to be dismantled from within but who's going to go up against the unions in there ?

ballsymchugh

ThisRegard wrote: »

Do people honestly think that anyone, from any party, could have or will be able to do a better job when up against such a mess that is the HSE ? It needs to be dismantled from within but who's going to go up against the unions in there ?

the HSE is under her brief. she did feck all to reign it in.

Fitzerb wrote: »

I agree she has done little in this Government (3/4 years)

However I wont be jumping for joy if Reilly of FG gets it.

This is the Dr when president of the IMO threatened to charge patients an extra 5 Euro if the Department did not pay the doctors 10,000 they claimed they were due

http://www.rte.ie/news/2002/0405/doctors.html

true, but O'Reilly was on the opposite side of the negotiations. everyone negotiates for their side. he'll have to change his tune in govt esp with labour's eyes on him.

gandalf

Good riddence. The Health Service is an absolute disgrace and has fallen to pieces during her tenure.

Surely this Government have to go now. They are falling to pieces. I suspect she announced this now to cause maximum damage as well. A final kick in the arse to the party that sunk the PD's eh

joey54

The reality is that the health portfolio is a poisoned chalice and will be for the foreseeable future. I think Harney genuinely believed she could make a difference and provide a better health care system. Even with this in mind I will never understand why she allowed herself be put into such a difficult ministerial post.


The government is falling apart, it is only a matter of time before Cowen decide he should really be President too!

I wonder did Gormley know Harney would be resigning from the cabinet. I suspect he didn't. Surely the Greens will have to pull the plug as the whole situation has become a complete farce.

ThisRegard

gandalf wrote: »

Good riddence. The Health Service is an absolute disgrace and has fallen to pieces during her tenure.

When was it ever together ?

ThisRegard

joey54 wrote: »

I will never understand why she allowed herself be put into such a difficult ministerial post.

It suited FF to have her there taking all the flak from them, I doubt there were too many ministerial positions available to her.

robk24

But sure the truth of it is she's just joining the rest of the slimy rats in making sure they get their full pension before anyone gets a chance to bring in a cap on their greedy future earnings....

56lcd

Best news in years, I am so delighted that she is gone. .... good riddance
Celebrations are in order.

BeardyFunzo

The Air Corps are going to save a ton of fuel now as well by not having to get her airbourne... so its good news for the environment too!

Fitzerb

dooferoaks wrote: »

You don't happen to have the figures do you, would be interesting to see a link if possible. I suppose a lot of people go on anecdotal evidence from their local hospital, I know my local general has lost 50+ beds. Maybe your statistics are day beds?

Sorry I am wrong on that statement. I read the stats incorrectly.
But when I dig into them they are scary
In the last 5 years our beds per 1000 people has gone down from 5.7 to 5.3 but we are spending €900 more for every person living in the Country than we were 10 years ago

I could be still reading them incorrectly there are stats on everything.

However, the one I know is the HSE has HR department of 2000 people.
That is just mind bending. Whoever gets this job next time out should be behave like Michael O Leary towards the staffing of administration. The money we have needs to go on front line expenditure.
Our hospital Building and equipment have improved over the years but it seems impossible to tackle the work practice and number in administration

I had great hopes she would sort it out and she performed well in other departments but she didnt make it happen in health.

Fitzerb

ballsymchugh wrote: »

the HSE is under her brief. she did feck all to reign it in.



true, but O'Reilly was on the opposite side of the negotiations. everyone negotiates for their side. he'll have to change his tune in govt esp with labour's eyes on him.

He was their best firnd when he was on that side of the table. It will be hard for him to stick it to them now. He comes over badly on TV. Like a old school teacher or something.

Mr.Micro

Harney sold out to the private sector some years ago and totally neglected the public health service and it has declined steadily under her watch. Very disappointed in her performance and she will not me missed. No doubt Super Biffo will take on that portfolio as well, he has turned into a little dictator, well I suppose he is surrounded by clowns.

Gael23

Good Riddance to her- she wont be missed. That said, I had an amount of respect for her politics until she took over as Minister for Health

phantom_lord

I think the replies here are frankly ridiculous. Blaming Harney for the state of the health service is absurd, it was a shambles long before her tenure. She deliberately took on the poisoned chalice of the challenge to reform the health system and came up against ingrained immovable vested interests. Looking at how blinkered people are on this topic it's clear why she was the only person willing to do even take up the challenge.

You guys are incredibly myopic in celebrating this; do you really think a different minister would have done a better job?

CoalBucket

Im delighted she is going but why resign the ministerial position with a few weeks to go.

If she is not gonna contest the election fair enough but to resign the cabinet post in order to give the position (and more importantly the pension) to another one of those leeches is a joke and totally talking the piss out of the tax payers. I'm raging !!!!!! :mad:

How long does a TD have to hold a cabinet position to entitle them to a pension ?

I would hazard a guess that if its say 60 days, the election will be called for 61 days after the reshuffle. :mad::mad::mad: