Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

I welcome this debate. I believe it is a good idea to hold a debate like this every now and again so that we can tease out issues in terms of where we should be going. Mar adúirt mé i mBéarla, tá áthas orm go bhfuil an rún seo curtha síos ag an Rialtas. Ar ndóigh, tacaím leis an rún go bhfuil muinín againne sa Rialtas agus san obair atá ar bun ag an gCeannaire.

I was interested to hear what Members opposite had to say about their leader, Deputy Kenny, a man I know well and whom I admire. While he lives in a neighbouring county, he lives closer to me than many of my colleagues in Galway city who are Deputies. I admire Deputy Kenny. Fine Gael has quite rightly resisted the temptation when called upon by the media time and again to ditch their leader because he is not doing well in the opinion polls. They have, I believe justifiably - the results speak for themselves - resisted the temptation to dump Deputy Kenny as leader in favour of the myriad of other suggestions put to them by the media. I can assure Members we are of the same mind. The captain of our team is a very capable Taoiseach. We will work with him to ensure renewed growth in this country despite the huge challenges facing us.

There have been many debates in regard to why this or that was not done in the past. I came to the conclusion many years ago that one should learn from the mistakes of the past. I can assure Deputies that any decision made by this Government was made in good faith based on the best information available on any given day. Much of the debate in this regard reminds me of the tourist who when he asked a man from west Cork the way to Skibbereen was told, "If I were you, I wouldn't start from here". We have all heard that story. The reality is that every day we go into Cabinet to make decisions, we are where we are. Wondering why-----

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