Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)

He continued, "I might have then. If there were similar circumstances then before all the new rules I probably would have." That is the ethical standard that the Green Party sees fit to support. It is not the belief that it is wrong to take money that is stopping him accepting wads of cash in brown envelopes, it is the rules.

Prior to his election the Minister, Deputy Gormley, told his party conference that on "Planet Bertie" one can get loans from people that one does not have to repay and spend £50,000 without a bank account. It seems that in 2008 one can do exactly the same on "Planet John". That is the reality.

To give him his due, the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Eamon Ryan, has been less than willing to be a party to the Fianna Fáil mantra. On Newstalk last week he said the Green Party consistently had confidence in the Mahon tribunal. He went on to say that he had always said the tribunal was, is and should act independently and without bias. It was set up by the Oireachtas to do exactly that. I was perplexed then that he did not see fit to support Fine Gael's motion today but then I remembered that he is a member of the Green Party and he does what Fianna Fáil tells him. The man who once would be President is now reduced to a political slave.

Both Green Party Cabinet Ministers continually harp on about letting the tribunals do their work. This line was first uttered by the Minister of State, Deputy Sargent who, as soon as he was ensconced in the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, had a Pauline conversion in his attitude to the Taoiseach's finances. In September, Deputy Sargent asked Fine Gael what had changed since the general election that brought us to move a motion of no confidence in the Taoiseach. Let me tell him. In mid-May, around the time Deputy Sargent was describing the Taoiseach as a dead man walking, the Taoiseach said he had co-operated fully with the tribunal and given it all the explanations it needed. We now know that was not true. We also know now that the sum of money we are dealing with is not £48,000 but in today's terms is much closer to €300,000. We are now aware the tribunal threatened the Taoiseach with a summons due to his failure to give it the information it requested.

I say to Deputy Sargent that this is pretty important stuff. I am sorry he is not in the Chamber to hear me. Now it is time to ask him a question. Is Deputy Sargent happy? Is the Green Party happy with the position the country is now in? Is the Green Party happy to be the bulwark of Fianna Fáil? Is it the mudguard of Fianna Fáil? Is it the Green mudguard of this Government? The truth of the matter is that the Green Party has failed utterly in all of its principles. The Green Party betrayed everything it said on this side of the House once it went over there.

I put it to the 16 absent Ministers, the two Ministers of State who are present, to the absent members of the Green Party and to the Progressive Democrats, and in the presence of the great "dog days of Mahon" himself, Deputy Finian McGrath, who must have blown his whistle because they are afraid to come in, that the country deserves better Government than what we have. It is not acceptable in a democracy for the Taoiseach, the leader of the country, not to be tax compliant. In Britain Peter Hain resigned. Around the world in every single democracy we can think of it is not acceptable that a leader would do what the Taoiseach has done and treat the tribunal the way in which he has treated it. Let everybody support the Fine Gael motion.

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