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How easily they forget
Read more about: Fine Gael, Health, Labour Party, Limerick East, Progressive Democrats, Scandal
Fine Gael and other members of the opposition are suffering a bout of selective amnesia.
Yesterday, Junior Minister for Health Tim O’Malley used his gob before he used his brain and made a statement on the Prime Time Investigates programme claiming that “some people” liked having waiting lists of children with mental problems as it gave them a sense of power.
Despite issuing an apology for this statement after an outcry from hospital consultants, the opposition parties screamed for blood demanding he resign.
While we are on the subject of blood, the opposition are forgetting the behaviour of a previous minister for health, and he was not a piddly little junior minister either.
Were members of his party looking for him to resign after the Hepatitis C scandal of 1994? No. As late as 2002, the current leader of Fine Gael was still supporting this politician, and wasn’t calling for anyone to be sacked. While Fine Gael was not in government, was a man with such a scandalous response to the Hepatitis C crisis a satisfactory Taoiseach for Enda Kenny?
A bunch of “bloody” hypocrites, the lot of them. Is it any wonder that voter turnout in this country is shameful.
I’m no fan of Tim O’Malley or his neo-conservative pack of cronies in the Progressive Democrats, but he is not the only one in Leinster House who should use their brain before they use their mouth.
Guess what ? I am not a FG supporter, but IMHO you, and the “conventional wisdom” are very wrong about the lessons of the Hep C scandal. The implicit view of that “wisdom” is that, faced with a claimant for compensation, the State’s stance should be “you must be right, how much can we give you ?”.
neo-conservative pack of cronies in the Progressive Democrats
the PD’s are not neo-conservatives. It is by and large a theory about foreign policy. I don’t know do the PD’s have much thinking on foreign policy.
Interesting non the less.
Tim O’Malley’s behavioural problems…
It wasn’t just his remarks about the waiting lists that would lead people to demand his resignation. You can add in his comments about people with depression needing to shake themselves out of it, and his surprised (it’s all news to me) look when it questioned on PrimeTime about provisions for young people faced with difficulties. He has been a champion ‘the government should do something’ person since taking office, if after 4 years he is still only settling in then God help us all.
Despite issuing an apology for this statement after an outcry from hospital consultants, the opposition parties screamed for blood demanding he resign.
Just to make a quick point, O’Malley has yet to apologise. In the article you link, he said “I know consultant psychiatrists are doing excellent work for their patients, I simply wish to see the most effective processes put in place to allow them see as many patients as possible… I regret if a couple of sentences, taken from a lengthy interview, gave an impression that I was of any different opinion.”
That’s the wordy equivalent of saying “I regret the fact that what I said offended you”, without actually saying that he regrets saying it or that he is sorry for saying it.
Now, I may have mis-heard the section of the PT:I show in question (trying to find it now), but I’m sure they referenced a report from 2003 which called for more facilities… when the failure to act on this report, amongst others, was put to O’Malley he said “I’m only in the job 4 years”… it seemed to go unchallenged in the show, but am I the only one confused by his maths?
Yeah, just found it; on the Realplayer file linked on the RTE site, go to the 38-39th minute, and it’s mentioned that a report was published in 2000, and then a further report was published in 2003 (that said, the woman speaking about it doesn’t detail what the 2003 report said)