Who would you fire?
- Martin Cullen, Minister for E-Voting:
Wasted 62 million on an e-voting system that is now gathering dust in warehouses throughout Ireland. - Dick Roche, Minister for Dirty Water:
Failed to provide safe, clean drinking water for the people of Galway. - Micheal Martin, Minister Who Didnt Read His Nursing Home brief:
Stood idly by while patients suffered in nursing homes, claimed he didnt know there was a problem because he had not read his brief. - Michael McDowell, Minister for Injustice:
Master of tough talk, while detection rates plummet and serious crime rates soar.
UPDATE: Polling has closed and the loser is: Martin Cullen
You’re fired! Minister for E-voting voted off by public in FG poll
The Minister most voters would like to see fired is Transport Minister Martin Cullen, according to an online poll conducted by Fine Gael. The Party’s Seanad Leader Senator Brian Hayes has revealed that the online poll on finegael.ie attracted 2,016 votes, with Martin Cullen emerging as the clear winner with over 40% of the vote.
“It is clear that public anger about Fianna Fáil and the PDs’ profligacy with taxpayers’ money is best exemplified by the e-voting debacle. When Fianna Fáil and the PDs wasted €60 million to foist a flawed e-voting system on a reluctant electorate, not a single Minister carried the can. But the majority of voters in the Fine Gael poll think Martin Cullen should have faced the high jump and would fire him if they were given the chance.
“The Minister the public would next like to fire is Dick Roche. Minister Roche, who refused to take responsibility for contaminated drinking water in Galway, attracted 578 votes. Michael McDowell’s failure to tackle rising serious crime and falling detection rates won him 363 votes while Micheál Martin’s failure to read his Ministerial briefing notes saw him receive 241 votes.”
May 15th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
Or Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbit:
A “credible” alternative that still cannot agree on all its policies, despite two years of trying.
A “credible” alternative where one party is lacking commitment to the other.
A “credible” alternative that cried when Bertie was invited to Westminster.
A “credible” alternative that are scared of asking hard questions because of polls.
A “credible” alternative that does not show solutions for nurses or for consultants, only offers of hosting conversations.
“it is only by the quality of the Opposition that we can test the mettle of the Government.” Sadly, the opposition were awful.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:44 pm
Or the Taoiseach who signed blank cheques but claims to be an accountant
Or the Minister for Justice who promised 2000 Gardai on the streets not ‘recruited’
Or the Minister for Finance who said there would be no stamp duty reform and then defended it
Or the Minister for Education who promised a school building programme and then reneged on it after the last election
The quality of opposition, it is true, may be awful but the quality of government is as bad, if not worse
May 16th, 2007 at 8:28 am
If we agreed on everything, we’d be the same party and aren’t you of the opinion that all the parties have the same policies?
The media probed as hard as possible to find any exceptional circumstances where Labour might join Fianna Fail. The FG/Labour partnership looks rock solid compared to the PDs going off on a tantrum and threatening to bring down the government only to come back whimpering to say in power for a few more months.
Westminster isn’t a big deal - an opportunistic photo op to take credit for the work of greater men like John Hume, David Trimble and many others.
The coalition is asking hard questions in areas like the Irish curriculum - FF are taking the safe option of putting their head in the sand.
Everyone agrees that we should use benchmarking - it would be irresponsible to suggest otherwise.
This government is awful - judging by the amount of money wasted, rampant inflation (led by public services), the cost of housing, the state of the health service, the state of water quality, the way everything from laptops being stolen to cars being damaged is becoming a regular occurrence around Castletroy