Friday 16th December

LAST sunday I joined an impressive crowd of people at a protest for Greystones Harbour. It was great to see such a turn out, loads of families, kids playing. Sadly the promised appearance of Dustin the Turkey failed to happen - the run up to Christmas obviously has him hiding.

Its been a busy run up the Christmas break in general. Last Friday I went down to Cork to host an Arts Forum. It was organised by Labour Artists and was really heartening to have such interested and committed people turn up to debate and thrash out the issues. Cork has had a great year as European City of Culture overall but we do need to see a continued and coordinated approach to the arts. Of course, needless to say Labour's Arts Policy "art4all" is availabe on www.labour.ie ! Hmm, seems that every week on this blog I'm directing people to our website....but it's all there folks! And I would like your comments and feedaback on any of it!

Actually I was down in Cork over the summer to speak at the Older Women's Network and I spoke on the incredibly poor represenation of women in the Dail, managerial positions etc. Today I've just noticed on breakingnews.ie that the Central Stats Office has confirmed that the figures are as disappointing as ever. "13% of serving TDs are women, while female businesspeople also make up only 30% of positions on state boards." It means that issues that affect women are being legislated for by a constant majority of men....would childcare for example have taken a back seat for so long if there was a higher representation of women making decisions?

Oh and for any Wicklow based bloggers - I hope you slept soundly through our recent earthquake - I certainly did!

Happy Christmas!!


Irishblogs LizMcManus Labour Party Greystones Harbour Greystones Wicklow
Labour Arts Labour Women Bray earthquake Childcare

Today, I was lucky enough to be invited along to Ballyknockan Cookery School in Glenealy, Co. Wicklow to present the newly qualified chefs with their certs. They fed me well, proving their accolades were much deserved, and it was certainly one of the highlights of my week! I came across a great quote which I shared with the new chefs-"Cooking is like love. It should be entered into with abandon or not at all!" Best of luck to all of them!

Unfortunately, there'll be a return to rushed sandwiches tomorrow as we face the announcement of the Budget. More updates on this later....

Greystones Marina update

AT THE recent Greystones branch meeting, the Labour Party had a long discussion about the proposed harbour development. At the last Local Election we expressed grave concerns about the scale of the development, the traffic pollution generated and the impact it would have on Greystones.

We welcome the fact that more people are critical of this proposal and we believe it should be withdrawn. There is a great need to improve and upgrade the harbour area but this kind of development-led plan does not serve the community.

We intend to carry out further evaluations once the environmental impact study is published. So watch this space…

For more information check out www.greystonesmarina.com

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Monday, November 28

THIS is always a busy time of year in Dail Eireann and I have been meaning to update the site long before now, so apologies for not doing it sooner.

A lot of different things have been happening since I last updated, we have had the Budget estimates released by the Government recently where A&E charges were doubled to €65 a visit. The GP-only cards do not cover A&E visits so this is very disheartening news on the health front indeed.

People on waiting lists and enduring terrible conditions in overcrowded Accident and Emergency Units will also find it difficult to believe that the Tanaiste actually failed to spend more than €56m that was available to her this year.

Labour Youth had another successful conference in Galway and I spoke along with the Party Leader, Deputy Pat Rabbitte and Deputy Michael D Higgins. Check out this link on the Labour Youth website.



I spoke to the delegates about mental health and awareness in Ireland and the pitiful resources given to this the Cinderella of Irish health services. Labour is the only party to have a specific policy on mental health, you can read more here.

George Bernard Shaw once said that youth is wasted on the young and having spent time at the conference of Labour Youth over the years I have found the complete opposite to be true!



I was pleased to meet residents of Greystones last week when concerns were raised about proposals for the harbour. This is one of the planning issues that I am keeping a close eye on and will be keeping in contact with the local residents this issue.

Finally the Labour Party will be having its Wicklow convention on December 4 and we are hoping to see all our Labour members out in force.

WASTERS

LMM.PR.WASTERS
Originally uploaded by Liz McManus TD.

I really believe that the people of our State are sick and tired of the waste that the current government are consistently in charge of. The Labour Party are sick and tired of taxpayers money beinig wasted too, and as such have launched this "Wasters" campaign. We've been highlighting the vast wastage of money on various botched projects.

For example:
The Great Computer Squander: E160 million on a health service computer system that doesn't work.

Michael McDowell's Pricey Prisons: E30 million for a prison site worth E6 million.

Bertie's Blunder in Abbotstown: E157 million to clear a site for a stadium that wasn't built.

The Tunnel Throw-away: The Port Tunnel is running E335 million over budget.

Charlie McCreevy's Horsey Hand-out: E15 million for this pet project!

For that waste listed above that comes to E753 million, if Labour was in Government the following would have been achieved instead:

2000 extra Gardai on the streets for 9 years.

An additional teacher into every primary school for 5 years.

A free pre-school place for every child under 4 years of age.

The funding of the redevelopment of hospitals such as the Mater and Temple Street.

Liz McManus, T.D. at Drogheda United v Bray Wanderers, 23 Oct. 05

This Sunday I joined up with some of my Labour colleagues, Cllrs Paul Bell and Ger Nash to add my voice to supporters of Bray Wanderers.

Liz McManus, T.D. at Drogheda United v Bray Wanderers, 23 Oct. 05
Originally uploaded by lizmcmanustd.

Despite a valiant effort by Bray Wanderers, Drogheda won out in the end with a 2-1 score. It must be remembered though that Drogheda United is a professional football club, i.e. this is the day job for the players. Poor old lads in Bray have to do a day's work before they tog out for their team! Of course, hearty congratulations to Drogheda. Next time, next time...

October 11th - A year of Harney in health

To mark Deputy Harney's, Tanaiste and Minister for Health, first year in office and the weekly protests at the Mater Hospital A&E department organised by my party colleague, Deputy Joe Costello, members of the Labour Party, Patients Together as well as members of the public, joined together to voice their frustrations at a health service still in decline.



The powers that be obviously backed our campaign because the sun shone for the hour of the protest before the sky opened up just as we were finishing off.

You can read our analysis on Minister Harney's first year in office here.

October 3rd Update

This is the start of my weekly update now that the Dail is back in session. You can find my press releases both local and national on the Labour website.

I hope to use this forum as an informal weekly update. And as I said previously I welcome your comments and look forward to exploring the new medium of blogging.

Arts4All


Martin Murphy (chairperson of Labour Artists), myself, Deputy Jack Wall

The Labour Party recently launched a detailed arts policy because we believe it is the job of the Government to ensure cultural rights are a reality.

Among the recommendations is for enhanced facilities and infrastructure of communities, so that the full potential for local access to and appreciation of cultural services can be realised.

Find out more information here.

Clonmel Think-in

The Parliamentary Labour Party recently held its annual start of the political year meeting in Clonmel. Among the issues discussed included the continuing campaign calling for the roll-out of Breast Check to the whole country and childcare, as well as work and campaigns to be undertaken by the party over the coming Dail session.




Councillor Phil Prendergast adjusting the Labour Leader, Deputy Pat Rabbitte's pink ribbon at a recent Breast Check Now protest.

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