Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

That is what I do not accept. We are not getting the details of the gap. We are not supposed to be talking about conflicting sides. In a negotiation between a nightwatchman and an employer, arguably they are conflicting sides. We are talking about people who are supposed to be partners. Greece is supposed to be a partner in the European Union. All sides are supposed to be working towards a resolution that is in the best interests of all, yet it is being framed, as the Minister has just framed it, as some sort of hostile negotiation that we cannot get the details of. I find that suspicious, to put it mildly. I believe the reason we cannot get details of the gap from the Minister or the Commissioner is that if we did get them we would discover the EU is being vindictive, that this is a question of trying to politically discipline the Greek Government and send a signal that we are not going to appear to give any ground to a government which has demanded an end to austerity.

Is that not the reason? Even if it is not, how can the Minister, as the representative of the State, say that he does not know the detail?