John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

The Deputy then talks about the Green Party, but we should look at the facts. An excellent document was prepared for the joint committee on this and it showed the spending of the various political parties. Which political party spent the least amount of money? The Deputy is now trying to make out that Fine Gael and its members are going around like church mice. If he looked at the individual spending of candidates, he will see that some of the Fine Gael candidates at the last local election painted the town with the amount of money they spent. I find that disagreeable, because those candidates have an incredible advantage. I do not know where they get the money — they may be wealthy themselves — but they use it to put out leaflet after leaflet, while others who do not have that money cannot compete. We are trying to have a level playing pitch here.

Deputy Shatter spoke about President Obama and the small donations he received. President Obama also got huge donations from major companies. Deputy Shatter gave the impression that Fine Gael was supporting President Obama, but there are many of his younger, more right wing colleagues who supported Mr. McCain. That is their democratic right.

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