There is no substitute for actual Gardaí patrolling from open, staffed garda stations in rural and urban areas!
Both recent governments are responsible for cuts in garda numbers and services.
This resulted in a reduction in over 2000 gardaí since and the closure of about 130 garda stations including several in Co. Tipperary.
Five garda stations were closed in January 2013 in Co. Tipperary.
The low level of garda recruitment now in place will not even replace the number of gardaí retiring.
A loss of 44 Gardaí in Co Tipperary took place in the period from 2010-2015 alone.
All other sitting Co Tipperary TDs, without exception, except myself, supported cuts in garda services. They are all now pretending otherwise!
Don’t Believe a Word They Say!
The number of new recruits is gossly inadequate to restore the garda service and to protect the public. Multiples of this number should be immediately recruited. All retiring gardaí must be replaced. Because of the time lag between recruiting and graduating some emergency measures should be put in place.
To meet the public safety emergency, retired gardai should be offered short term re-employment on full pay and existing gardaí must be allowed to continue in office without damage to their pensions.
All the closed garda stations must be re-opened and staffed without delay.
Seamus Healy TD
23/02/2016
087 2802199
Deputy Seamus Healy has condemned Tánaiste Joan Burton for one of the meanest cuts yet.
Having insulted pensioners with a miserly €3 per week budget increase she now has instructed officers of the Department of Social Welfare to cut that €3 from sick pensioners who require a Special Diet.
Hard to believe – yes, Well I am attaching a copy of the cut notification received by a 90 year old pensioner (personal details are excluded).
This is one of the many cuts targeting pensioners such as abolition of telephone allowance, reduction in household benefits package, reduction in fuel allowance, increased prescription charges, abolition of the bereavement grant and the list goes on.
Deputy Healy has called on Labour Party Tánaiste Joan Burton T.D. to reverse this cut immediately.
Seamus Healy TD
087 2802199
The most consistent and angriest complaint on the door steps is of broken promises and the resultant targeting of those on low and middle incomes for cuts and new taxes.
When considering promises and announcements by Labour and Fine Gael in this General Election Campaign, voters are considering what happened to the promises they made in the last General Election Campaign.
The Public have been pointing out to me the litany of broken promises which include:
St. Michael’s Unit.
At a local level, Labour Leader Eamonn Gilmore, promised to protect South Tipperary General Hospital. Labour Minister, Kathleen Lynch, in government, closed down St Michael’s Psychiatric Unit in Clonmel and transferred it to Kilkenny.
Hospital Trolleys
We will “end the scandal of Hospital Trolleys” said Enda Kenny. The result is Trolley Chaos in our Emergency Departments, the closure of 2,000 hospital beds, the loss of 11,000 health staff and the loss of 2 million home help hours.
Water Tax
Through the 2011 General Election TESCO AD and in its election manifesto, The Labour Party promised to prevent the introduction of domestic water tax. In government they agreed to introduce this tax and Minister Alan Kelly is now implementing it.
Child Benefit
In the 2011 General Election Tesco AD, the Labour Party said it would prevent Fine Gael reducing Child Benefit. Labour leader Joan Burton, in government, did the opposite and cut Child Benefit.
FAMILY HOME TAX
Fine Gael Leader, Enda Kenny, said “ It Is Morally Wrong, Unjust and Unfair to Tax a Person’s Home”. But in Government, he introduced this unfair tax.
Lone Parents
Speaking in the Dáil on 18th April 2012, Minister Joan Burton said she would only proceed with plans to reform the One Parent Family Payment by 2014/15 if she got a “credible and bankable commitment” by the time of Budget 2013 that the Irish Government would put in place “a system of safe, affordable and accessible child care, similar to what is found in the Scandinavian countries to whose systems of social protection we aspire”.
Minister Burton went ahead with the changes without any such child care system being in place.
Crime
Enda Kenny promised to increase the Garda Force by 2,000 Gardaí. The result was 2,000 less Gardaí, 130 Garda Station closed and increased levels of rural crime.
Heating Allowances
Then there was the Labour Manifesto promise to invest in ending fuel poverty which causes unnecessary deaths of older people every winter. “However, Labour will also take immediate action to alleviate the risk of fuel poverty in the short term by reinvesting €40 million from the
carbon tax to alleviate fuel poverty, and by developing a national fuel
poverty strategy as set out in Labour’s Fuel Poverty and Energy
Conservation Bill.” Labour Party Manifesto 2011.
Instead, the heating allowances were cut by the Labour Leader
The Public are fed up of broken promises. They are taking the recent spate of promises from all the political parties with a large dose of salt.
The Door Steps say Don’t Believe Them and Don’t Let It Happen Again!
Seamus Healy TD
Tel : 087-2802199
08/02/2016
Workers & Unemployed Action 