Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy had his chance to speak.

On the significance of the decision made, I pay tribute to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan. There is no doubt that he has made an excellent start in leading the country's economic recovery. The analogy he used at the weekend was that when one was learning to swim, sooner or later one had to let go of the bar and take off the armbands. We may never again have the opportunity we have at this time, where the climate within the European institutions and our environment is as good as it is to make the break we need to make. Deputy John Paul Phelan was right to say history would be the ultimate gauge of this. Sooner or later, the country was going to have to make the decision and it was going to make it now or in 12 months time. We do not know what circumstances will be like in 12 months or whether conditions will then be as good for us to make it.

People have taken a massive amount of personal pain, be it through their pay packet, their mortgage or the fact that they have lost their house, their job, their children to emigration or a future generation. They need some hope and a sense that somebody is back at the helm. We now have the opportunity to decide our future economic destiny. The day we surrendered it was a day when we had to ask ourselves what had been the purpose in 1916 or 1922 or in the intervening period if, at the stroke of a pen, we could give away our economic and fiscal independence because clearly we were not able to manage it. The country was dragged through indignity and embarrassment as a result. The damage this surrender did to families, individuals, businesses and a whole generation will take a long time to be undone. Trust must be rebuilt in the political system.

We have taken the first step, in which I wish the Government well. We have opposition for the sake of opposition, but now of all times people need to get behind the country, regardless of who is in government. They must support the country and sell it in a positive light. They must stop knocking the Government just for the sake of knocking it. Everything the Government has done since it took office has been knocked for the sake of it. That record needs to change.

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