New Taoiseach: ‘Raging health and housing crisis must end’, says Cllr Sarah O’Reilly
He tells you what he thinks you want to hear.
Simon Harris was elected Taoiseach this afternoon after a whirlwind couple of weeks in Irish politics. Much is expected from the 37-year-old minister who has been in the political arena since his early 20s.
Local Aontú Cllr, Sarah O’Reilly has little confidence in a services improvement for the electorate under his tenure.
“Simon Harris has a great command of the English language and he has no problem telling you what he thinks you want to hear, unfortunately that's all it is, talk and talk is cheap,” she continued. “It's a big game of ‘Simon Says’ and I am not going to play!
At the moment, I would say that Fianna Fáil and all the Government parties would do anything to avoid a General Election, particularly after getting it so badly wrong in the referendum. There is a public push-back against hate speech laws and of course the raging health and housing crises not to mention our roads disintegrating before our eyes.
Cllr O’Reilly meanwhile, doesn’t believe that a Cabinet reshuffle will be of significance. “Simon will not want to annoy too many. I would say that the Minister for Justice, Helen McEntee will go and there will be a couple of others promoted.
“Simon Harris’ record on keeping his promise is very poor. And, I quote; ‘We’re going to make sure by the end of this year, no child waits in this country longer for a scoliosis procedure than four months’. There are currently 327 children with scoliosis waiting for spinal surgeries with 78 of these waiting for more than four months.
Regarding Minister Humphrey’s elevation to deputy leader of Fine Gael this week, Cllr O’Reilly added; “Heather, is now in a powerful position that she has earned through her hard work and dedication to public service and I admire her for that. I am hopeful that she might use her position at the Cabinet table to get much needed additional funding for Cavan County Council to address the huge deterioration in our public roads.”