Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

During the course of the Prague summit, Commissioner Spidla, who deals with employment matters, gave an interview in which he suggested the Government should follow the example of Austria, Denmark and the Netherlands in considering introducing innovative work practices and retraining schemes to combat unemployment here. Those suggestions are fairly similar to some of the proposals advocated by the Labour Party for some time. What consideration has the Taoiseach given to those suggestions?

With regard to the summit tomorrow and Friday, does the Taoiseach expect to have a conclusion that will provide the legal guarantees being sought over a number of areas? Will that be sufficient for the Taoiseach to propose the holding of another referendum on the Lisbon treaty?

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