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Updated 8.30pm
TAOISEACH ENDA KENNY has told independent TDs that the choice facing them is either supporting a Fine Gael minority government or a second election.
The Fine Gael leader made the comments during ongoing talks with 15 independent TDs about the formation of a minority government.
Fine Gael has made clear it will not support a Fianna Fáil minority government, despite Micheál Martin’s party continuing their own discussions with independent deputies in a bid to win support.
The Fine Gael-led talks have entered their third day at Government Buildings with the Green Party no longer taking part after it said earlier it would not enter government with either Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil.
The talks have so far focussed on housing, jobs and rural development, mental health and how a partnership government would work, with Fine Gael minister Richard Bruton last night outlining how there would be a more open budgetary process.
A paper on climate change that was presented this morning was said to be well received and there was a discussion on a disability paper which requires further costings.
Justice and equality issues were discussed this afternoon with education on the agenda later. There have been several bilateral meetings on the fringes of the talks with Kenny meeting with the brothers Michael and Danny Healy-Rae earlier.
Greens out
Speaking after three days of discussions with Fine Gael and talks with Fianna Fáil this evening, Green Party Leader Eamon Ryan said that his party will not be supporting either in a minority administration.
Ryan also said that he doesn’t think either party will be able to form a minority government with the support of independents alone.
Both he and his Dáil colleague Catherine Martin outlined these views to their own party members this evening.
Ryan said his party was speaking with both Fine Gael and independents but that there were “significant difference” between themselves and others.
“We do not believe it would have the necessary numbers to provide a stable administration, which could set our country in a new direction,” he said.
Ryan said the same was the case for Fianna Fáil:
We had similar talks with Fianna Fáil this evening but it appears that they will similarly be unable to establish a broad rainbow coalition to set up an effective minority government.
Ryan added that his party will continue to try to assist in the formation of a government but from the opposition benches.
The final decision from the Greens comes after what he told reporters was “frank discussion” with Enda Kenny last night.
“The Taoiseach asked us a question last night – it was a very frank discussion – in terms of he had to know where everyone stood, were we likely to be able to go into government set up, take office. What we said is we don’t think it’s going to work for us on this occasion,” Ryan said.
A Green party spokesperson also confirmed that the Greens would “probably be in opposition”.
Independents waver
Waterford TD John Halligan, who is part of the Independent Alliance, said yesterday that it would be “very difficult” for him to agree to a deal with the Fine Gael.
“I am having difficulties with where the talks are going and how they’re going. I feel that a programme for government should have been presented first and then discussed,” he told TheJournal.ie
The pace we’re going at at the minute means it would take us a year [to form a government].
Some independents have also met with Fianna Fáil today as it attempts to form its own minority government.
However, politicians on all sides of the various talks appear to acknowledge that negotiations between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are inevitable.
‘Some sort of arrangement’
Micheál Martin told the independent deputies who questioned his stance that it was up to the Taoiseach to make contact with his party and not the other way around.
Yesterday, Fine Gael minister Leo Varadkar told reporters: “I do think it will be difficult to form a stable government without some sort of arrangement between the two large parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.”
Speaking on Morning Ireland earlier, Fianna Fáil TD Thomas Byrne ruled out a coalition deal with Fine Gael, but not the idea of supporting a minority Fine Gael government.
However he stressed that Fianna Fáil is still attempting to form its own minority government.
Fine Gael plans further talks with independents tomorrow and on Friday with a view to developing position papers that could then be presented to Fianna Fáil as early as this weekend.
There has also been a suggestion that contact between the two largest parties in the 32nd Dáil could be made as early this evening.
But Fianna Fáil is also hoping to hold further meetings with independent TDs on Monday and Tuesday of next week.
‘Farce’
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin has again criticised Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil for so far failing to talk to each other. Waterford TD David Cullinane told reporters at Leinster House today:
It’s been a month since the election and we still have the farce where the two parties with the biggest mandates and the biggest number of seats are not talking to each other. We believe that they should.
He defended his own party’s reluctance to enter any government talks, insisting that Sinn Féin did not get a mandate to do so.
“We sought a mandate to lead a government, we didn’t get that,” he said.
We do have a mandate not to prop up these parties and we’ll keep to that.
- With reporting by Rónan Duffy
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Well balanced and non judgemental article.. if only everyone could think and act that way…
What we need is a Whole System that works,
It’s time to drain the sespool of leaders and show them with your VOTES , who are the real bosses , they work for us ,NOT the other way around
@Karllye kripton: the politicians don’t decide what drugs get approved, to do so would drive healthcare to a dystopian system to be decided by public opinion rather than expert medical professionals, so I’m unsure how votes would achieve your desired effect
@Karllye kripton: that’ll make a huge difference .. not .. you cant vote out any of the leaders in THE HSE .. they are employees if the state …
@Vocal Outrage: Unfortunately this isn’t true. Look at Orkambi. Deemed to be not cost effective by the NCPE. Recommended not for reimbursement. Simon Harris decides to fund it. Despite this money coming at the expense of various other cost effective treatments. I wish the general public were fully aware of what a self serving decision this was, and how much it has cost the HSE, for a very marginal benefit, when you look at the overall CF population. But it looks good in the press.
@Peter Wheen: my point exactly, when you make populist medical policy decisions like that, against professional advice, then other parts of the service will suffer. I guess I was referring to how it should be
My mum was seen by many consultants in a private hospital in Dublin for pains that eventually had her bed ridden. After 4 months of various tests and different pain killers she took very ill and rushed to hospital. A simple CT scan not done previuosly by any consultant showed she was riddled with cancer and died the next day. My trust in private hospitals was questioned from that day onwards..
I remember my granfather saying he was on 9 pills a day in his late 70s. Now a day most fit 30 year olds are putting 4 tablets into themselves
Something is definitely wrong if half a million people are on anti depressiants. It’s all a scam
@Tom Padraig: Perhaps rather than blaming the medication, you should consider the circumstances that lead to people requiring antidepressants as opposed to labelling it all a scam.
@Philip Kavanagh: He is not wrong. One example would be the number of teens on Meds to treat their “ADHD” because they once told mummy to fork orf after eating a bag of skittles and downing five cans of red bull.
@Philip Kavanagh: As evidenced by the experience of those involved in the Air Corps chemical scandal, many if not most people on ADs do not need them. However they are the current quick “fix” for clinicians and a very lucrative one for industry.
The overprescription of ADs is a scourge & a scandal. The increase in anxiety & depression is being driven by what we eat, what we drink and what we breath.
ADs are one of the current unsustainable answers to an already unsustainable problem, counselling is the other.
Treating depression & anxiety along with so called suicide prevention is a fooking industry at this point.
@Ronan Sexton: He is wrong. Some people need antidepressants for a specific period, others will be on them for life. Like for most illnesses, medication is only one of the range of treatments. To write it all of as a scam is dangerous and stupid.
@Chemical Brothers: Back up your unsubstantiated claim with actual sources that “many if not most people on ADs do not need them”.
@Philip Kavanagh: The numbers on antidepressants in Ireland is simply staggering. To believe that all these people actually have mental health illnesses is simply beyond belief.
We are mass medicating a massive portion of our population out of ignorance.
I suppose the matter of not wasting billions on whats planned to be a multi tier health system for our kids in the supposed “best new hospital in the world (if you are wealthy and can afford expensive health insurance)”, would allow us buy a couple of billions more worth of drugs.
Can I ask if Dr. O’Connor believes, like a recently published Cork based gastroenterologist, that IBS is a psychosomatic illness?
“More than 50 per cent of my outpatients have symptoms caused by psychosomatic conditions, such as irritable bowel syndrome, which cannot be elucidated or cured by the molecular biologists”
@Chemical Brothers: wow, a little off topic, no?
@James Brady: Not really IBS and the like is overwhelming Gastroenterology Depts in all our hospitals. If all Gastroenterologists think IBS is psychosomatic then the problem is not being dealt with properly and is a further drain on the same pot of resources.
It stands to reason that if spending on expensive drugs means less money for other hospital spending then if something else is using up funds like for huge numbers of unnecessary “arse covering” endoscopy that then further eats into the same pool of money.
@Chemical Brothers: It’s not unnecessary. It is necessary to investigate or you can’t say with confidence that pt has IBS as opposed to something more serious. IBS is a diagnosis of exclusion. If gastroenterologist is arranging endoscopy to investigate, they are likely looking to rule out conditions with overlapping presentations such as coeliac, crohns, ulcerative colitis. When all investigations are negative and the symptoms are still of concern, it is not unreasonable to attempt treatments which have evidence of working in these cohorts of patients such as specific diets etc.
@Stephen Chaney: Thanks for reply. Considering the large percentage of those diagnosed with IBS in outpatient clinics would an approach of trying diet first rather than an expensive, invasive, unpleasant endoscopy procedure with attendant risk be a better course of action?
Is the endoscopy first approach being driven more by fear of missing a cancer and being sued for same rather than what may be a simpler approach?
Genuinely just asking, have had cameras both ends with nothing sinister found but have subsequently had success with dietary measures but not necessarily measures that consultants are familiar with.
This is one of the best articles offering a comprehensive and fair analysis on our Health System, I can’t fault it. This should be framed.
Agree with Dr O’Connor – balanced views sustained by experience. Have been treated well in both systems, though public AnE requires patience.
In the UK there are set targets for delivery – something like Cancer surgery within 4 weeks maximum. If we set our public hospitals targets and then offered the patient free private care if not met that would focus minds on efficiencies.
@Pat Redmond: or just pay hospitals (and drs etc) per procedure. The countries with the shortest waiting lists are those with systems based on insurance where hospitals are paid like that.
he makes some valid points, but the chances of Ireland producing a high quality low cost health service are slim. We don’t do low cost for things like that in this country.
Great article and much that needs to be said- just would like to suggest another option- we need to recognise that the price tag on patented medicines bears no relationship to the cost of bringing the drug to market- but is the price unilaterally set by Pharma and is based on the maximum profit it can bring to its shareholders- which for life saving or life enhancing drugs is very high indeed. We need to bring some balance of power to the negotiating table to prevent monopoly abuse- ultimately by replacing the monopoly with an alternative incentive such as grants for R&D.
Off topic.
have your say