Mr. Charlie McCreevy:

Look, every politician of any persuasion and anyone who's been in public office for any period of time would always say, "Ah there was a few other things I should have done." I don't operate like that, Deputy. I spent 15 years on the backbenches of Fianna Fáil. I thought I'd be continuous to stay on the backbenches of Fianna Fáil. I got my chance at government given to me by Albert Reynolds and more or less I was on the Front Bench and Minister for the second half of my career. I enjoyed my time in the backbenches as well but probably caused a fair amount of mischief to my own party more than anything else. Certainly, the late Mr. Haughey would think like that anyway, but ... and I got my chance as Minister for Finance, and I always thought if I ever got the chance at being a Government Minister that I was going to approach every day as if it was going to be my last day there.