Joe O'Toole (Independent)

Easter bunnies - the two Paschals. I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Áine Brady. I agree with Senator O'Malley's assessment. This is a difficult Bill for everyone. In different company I tried in the past weekend to get people to respond to the Opposition position in the Dáil on the Bill. This is nothing to do with party politics. Not one person could understand how parties could say they believe in the national interest that they should facilitate the passage of the Bill through the House but that they would vote against it. I say to my colleagues who will be in government in a short while, that is what they complained about in terms of Fianna Fáil in government in the past two years. Those in Fianna Fáil complained about their own leadership, that it could not communicate what it was about. I could not understand what the Opposition was doing with the Bill in the past week. If I were in charge of the Government I would have done exactly as Senator O'Malley suggested and said, "Okay, take it yourself, guys and let us have an election, point things forward and move them forward." I dislike much about the Bill, but for the record, in case anyone suggests I get off the fence, were I an Independent Member in the Dáil I would have voted for it because I felt we needed the stability even though I did not like the Bill. I would also support all the changes that might be brought to improve it when the new Government is in place. That is what the outgoing Opposition should have been doing. That creates a difficulty.

We need to make another issue clear. My colleague, Senator Harris, said some things earlier, one of which I have been saying for three years. I made a speech in the House prior to the 2007 election in which I suggested that the Government which managed to reduce the price of houses would lose the following election. There is no question about it. I do not believe for one second that any other party in government would have had any greater handle on the housing market. I will not get into the question of stamp duty prior to the previous election, where people stood on it and what people were asking for. That is the reality. It does not point the finger.

We need to look at what we did. It is proper to allocate blame for mistakes made and that those in political control must take responsibility even if they are not personally accountable. Because they are the political heads, they must take responsibility. They will pay for it at the ballot box. That is the way the system works. It is important to recognise the difference between responsibility and accountability. The person who is accountable, who made the mistake, might be down the line but as a Member on the Government side indicated previously the person at the top who left the person in the job must take responsibility for it. That is the way the system works.

I say, as an independent observer - I will say it when the next Government is in office as well - just because a politician makes an error does not make the person corrupt. In the media it has become almost synonymous that when a person gets something wrong he or she is labelled corrupt. We saw the mistakes that were made. I have outlined them previously. The fact that bankers walked away with billions of euro does not mean that the politicians who made the mistakes which allowed that to happen did it corruptly.