Health, education and anti-crime the key: Kenny

Fine Gael will set up a dedicated Garda Organised Crime Unit if they are elected, party leader Enda Kenny pledged tonight.

He pointed to the frequent gangland murders and drew attention to a “new, worse breed of criminals” as he accused the Government of losing the war on crime.

Speaking at Fine Gael's 72nd Ard Fheis in Dublin, Mr Kenny said he was determined Ireland would become safe again.

He said there had to be more than empty promises and more money must be ploughed into health and education.

In a sustained attack on Bertie Ahern’s Government, Mr Kenny claimed the world had moved “beyond Fianna Fail’s farthest horizon” but they continued to play a new game by the old rules.

Mr Kenny said voters had become “disengaged and disenfranchised” with the Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrat coalition.

He accused the Government of making endless empty promises and of being interested only in themselves.

“It’s that same base instinct that sees them intent on rushing a referendum on June 11 to divert attention from their own broken promises,” he said.

“I agree with the objective of closing off an unintended loophole in our citizenship laws. But, I do not agree with the timing.

“We should only amend our Constitution when we have exhausted every alternative solution.”

Mr Kenny said the Government’s “headstrong approach” to the referendum risked undermining the credibility of the Good Friday Agreement.

“This is a time when all their efforts should be focused on having its implementation completed and a permanent end brought to all paramilitary activity, he said, "not on handing political ammunition to those who would see the Agreement destroyed.”

He said it was vital to invest radically and intensively in education, right from pre-school.

“The current early-start programme is at pilot stage. It has been for 10 years. And with one in five Irish people barely able to read or write, the move to the knowledge economy is a bit of a quantum leap. It requires quantum change,” he told delegates.

“A confident Ireland starts with education. We must make the best education a basic civil right. Not the random privilege of parenting or class.”

The Fine Gael leader said more anti-depressants were taken in Ireland than in any other EU country – twice as many as the next on the list which had made “prescription medication the new heroin”.

He criticised the Government for cutting research funding when last year alone 10,000 Irish people tried to take their own lives.

“We’re number one in the world for alcohol,” he added. “We spend 4 billion euro (£2.8bn) every year, drinking ourselves to oblivion.

“Alcohol is now costing this State more than it generates in tax. A good government would ask why? And how can we fix it? Because, there is such a thing as being too late.”

The leader urged the public to use their vote in the June elections to bring about much-needed change.