Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

It is important that Deputies have an opportunity to offer suggestions and solutions. Deputy Morgan has recognised that this is a serious national crisis. There is nothing to prevent Members of the House from making constructive suggestions and addressing the various issues that have been clearly set out for their information. The only conclusion I can draw from the resistance of Opposition Deputies who have protested that they cannot make suggestions during this debate, because they do not know what the circumstances are, is that their paucity of ideas will be exposed over the next two days. This debate will expose that despite all the verbiage we have heard from the Opposition since last September, it does not have any real solutions. At the end of the debate, it will be interesting to analyse how many good, concrete suggestions will have been made by the Opposition.

I have already listened to some parts of the debate since it started earlier this afternoon. Having been a Member of this House for over 20 years, I have listened to frequent taunts from the Fine Gael benches, in particular, about the negative approach that was taken by Fianna Fáil when it was in opposition in the 1980s.

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