There were heated exchanges in the Dáil when Sinn Féin claimed the Government misled the House over the €9 million phone pouch initiative announced in the budget and failing to declare that Minister for Education Norma Foley had been “extensively lobbied” by a company that produces them.
Sinn Féin finance spokesman Pearse Doherty had accused the Government of wasting public money, citing the €336,000 bicycle shed, the €1.4 million security hut and the “runaway” costs of the national children’s hospital.
He then told the House that two years ago Ms Foley met an executive of the company, Yonder, that produces the phone pouches.
Tánaiste Micheál Martin accused the party of “trying to manufacture” an issue for the general election saying: “I don’t like your insinuation.”
Mr Doherty said that every year 100,000 phone pouches, which prevent students accessing their devices during the school day, would have to be replaced at a cost of €2 million when there were other options that would cost nothing.
He said he had obtained Freedom of Information documents stating that “Minister Foley was intensely lobbied by an executive from Yonder, a company that makes these mobile phone pouches” and read out a letter from a Yonder executive about his meeting with Ms Foley.
“Why weren’t we told that Minister Foley met this executive at a conference two years ago where the executive gave her a phone pouch from Yonder? This doesn’t add up, because I recently, on the Dáil record, asked Minister Foley, did she have any meeting with a representative of a company that produces these mobile phone pouches.
“On the Dáil record, she answered no, and it’s simply not the case. The meeting happened. A phone pouch was given, and that happened over two years ago, and this is crazy stuff,” he said, asking: “what are you hiding?”
Tánaiste Micheál Martin said he was “hiding nothing”.
“I don’t like the way you’re trying to insinuate certain sort of characteristics,” he said. He said Ms Foley “was given a pouch two years ago, and she put it on the record”.
[ Phone pouch scheme will cost €2m every year as well as €9m outlay, McDonald saysOpens in new window ]
He accused Sinn Féin of “hypocrisy” when the Northern Ireland Executive financed similar phone pouches. Sinn Féin holds the finance portfolio said the party was doing this for “naked political” gain.
Mr Martin also defended Government public spending and said the bike shed was demanded by the Opposition. Labour Party leader Ivana Bacik then intervened and said “many members looked for decent bike parking, from both Government and Opposition”.
Mr Doherty said the Tánaiste could not be Pontius Pilate on the bike shed “and wash your hands of it”.
The Tánaiste said he had been “a long-term advocate for public health in this Dáil”. The phone pouches would be seen in time as a major step forward for the public health of young people, he believed.
Former US chief medical officer Dr Anthony Fauci “described social media as the public health threat of our time”. He made the same point at his party’s ardfheis.
“The impact of children is horrific, and you have been extremely disingenuous in your presentation of the arguments, in your dismissal of that public health dimension,” he told Mr Doherty.
