In a statement this afternoon, Richard Boyd Barrett TD, condemned the Taoiseach for deliberately misleading the Dail during Leaders Questions. In response to a question about the plight of Home Help workers and those who rely on their services, the Taoiseach, rather than answering the question, repeated a false claim made by Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore in the Dail last week, relating to disability cuts in the Dun Laoghaire area.

The Taoiseach was referring to Leaders Questions on 11 Oct, when Deputy Boyd Barrett raised the issue of cuts to Angels Quest Respite services with the Tánaiste. At the time, the Tánaiste misled the Dail and said that Deputy Boyd Barrett was “using” the issue of cuts to disabled people for his own political gain and claimed that he had an email in his possession written by Deputy Boyd Barrett, which confirmed this.

The Taoiseach repeated this claim again today and also said that Deputy Boyd Barrett had advised the parents of children affected by the cuts to the respite services to not meet with the Director of Services.

In fact the email referred to was written by one of the parents affected by the cuts to respite services and a member of the executive committee of the Carmona Parents and Families & Friends Association. Eamon Gilmore knew this when he falsely claimed it was written by Deputy Boyd Barrett. Unless the Tánaiste also mislead the Taoiseach, the Taoiseach would also have known when he repeated the claim today that Deputy Boyd Barrett was the author of the email.

(See original email pasted below and subsequent comments by parents group on Tánaiste’s misrepresentation of the email and its authorship.)

Deputy Boyd Barrett said: “Both the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have deliberately and cynically misled the house. They said things that were completely untrue and that they knew were untrue when they said them. In the process, they also misrepresented and trivialised the concerns of parents of the disabled children who are in Angels Quest - falsely claiming they had refused a meeting with the director of services to discuss the future of Angels Quest. Eamon Gilmore and Enda Kenny knew I had not written this email and yet they said said I had. They knew the parents had agreed to a meeting with Carmona Services but claimed they had not. This is a disgraceful abuse of their positions as the most senior politicians in the country and disgraceful abuse of the Dail itself.

I first met the some of the parent’s involved last Monday week when they came into my clinic. The parents group had contacted my office, and also that of Eamon Gilmore, the previous Friday. I encouraged the parents to meet with management and also offered to raise the issue at Leaders Questions on the following Thursday if they would like.

When the parents were in the Dail gallery last Thursday they had already accepted a meeting with the Director of Services which took place last night.

It is utterly untrue that I had any hand, act or part in an e mail sent from a parent, who is on the Eexecutive Committee of the Carmona Parents Families & Friends Association to his other colleagues on the Executive Committee updating them on the efforts to keep the service open – an email

Such dishonesty and distortion of the facts in the Dail, by first the Tánaiste and then the Taoiseach, particularly in relation to vulnerable families and their children is truly outrageous. It’s one thing to take political pot shots at another TD or at the opposition but to deliberately falsify facts, lie about a the actions of a fellow TD, and misrepresent the position of ordinary citizens who are doing their best to protect their children, is utterly disgraceful.

In the case of the Taoiseach today, it seems he would prefer to vilify me rather than answer a straight question on whether he would reverse the cuts to home help hours and stop the privatisation of the home care service. The Taoiseach and Tánaiste should publicly apologise to the Dail and to the parents of the vulnerable children they have misrepresented.”

Further information: Richard Boyd Barrett 086 7814520/087 6024821