Michael Mulcahy (Dublin South Central, Fianna Fail)

Since it came into office it has faced, in chronological order, a downturn in world economic activity, the Lisbon referendum and its aftermath, the pork food scare, a stock market crash and a banking crisis. In determining whether we should have confidence in the Government it is only fair to examine how it has reacted and fared in respect of several of these key policy issues. Most reasonable economic commentators agree a downturn in world economic activity has occurred but this seems to be missing from the speeches of every Fine Gael and Labour Party contributor to the debate. They seem to believe Ireland is the only country in the world suffering from an economic downturn. Since June, July, August and September of last year, worldwide activity has declined very significantly in all industrialised countries. Certain commentators appear to be in denial about this. However, the sooner they come clean and accept this basic fact, the sooner we can have some mature discussion on where we stand in Ireland today.

The Taoiseach was very clear in his leadership on the Lisbon treaty referendum but the people did not agree. The Government has embarked on a process of consultation and on the basis of that, on the basis of market research and on future changes which are being negotiated as we speak there may well be a second Lisbon treaty referendum this year. By any analysis, the pork food scare was very well handled and confidence was restored to that sector of the agriculture industry in a very short period.

I refer to the stock market crash and the banking crisis. I remind people of the very difficult night of 30 September of last year when it was clear by that Monday evening that there would be a run on all the banks in the country on the following Tuesday morning. If fairness to Fine Gael it had the wisdom and the courage to support the Government in its timely intervention and its introduction of the bank guarantee scheme. However, to its eternal discredit, the Labour Party, as usual, funked the hard decisions. If the Labour Party had its way on the morning after 30 September 2008 there would have been a run on the banks in Ireland. Every bank would have become insolvent and, in economic terms, Ireland would have gone back to the ice age. Let us deal with the facts and the solutions to certain undeniable facts. I note from my 17 or 18 years on Dublin City Council that when it comes to the hard decisions, the Labour Party talks the talk but it cannot walk the walk. Never was this more in evidence than during the banking crisis.

I welcome Deputies Maureen O'Sullivan and George Lee to the Chamber. It is a great honour for them to be elected and it is a great honour to represent people from any constituency. Yesterday was their day and I wish them the best of luck in representing their constituents in the Dáil. I refer to the earlier comments of Deputy George Lee, who made a very fine and impassioned speech. He criticised the Taoiseach and the Government and stated that he had no confidence in them. I was very surprised because Deputy Lee is supposed to be an economist. However, in his contribution he did not address the fact that there is a deficit of some €20 billion per year. He did not address how he or the Fine Gael Party proposes to reduce that deficit.

I put it to Deputy Lee, now that he has finally joined us, that it is not good enough or honest enough to come to the Chamber and state that one side or the other is wrong or is not up to the job. He should get off the sidelines and say what he would do. Let the House hear his solutions because Fianna Fáil is prepared to take the action and the Taoiseach is prepared to take the action to reduce that deficit, to stabilise the finances, to stabilise the banking system and to support enterprise. We are doing it. I was not particularly surprised that Deputy Lee did not come up with any solutions because he was not particularly accurate either in that infamous programme, "How We Blew the Boom". He did not mention in that programme the huge investment made by the previous Government in roads, schools, special needs teachers and transport facilities. He did not mention the reduction of our national debt or the money accrued in the pensions reserve fund or in foreign aid. He did not do all these things. It is about time that commentators in RTE or elsewhere began to become a little more balanced, a little more honest. I wish Deputy Lee the very best and I hope that in his next contribution he has the courage to come in here and put on the line and on the record what he says he would do to reduce the public deficit of €20 billion. We can then examine his proposals and the public can examine his proposals.

I have confidence in this Government in so far as it is courageously tackling the major issues of the day. I will not have confidence in this Government if I ever believe it lacks the courage or the initiative to tackle those problems head-on. However, it is tackling these major issues at the moment.

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