Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

When that happens, the Labour Party will be obliged to state what it intends to do. If, as the Deputy expects, it wins the election, whenever it is held, it will be obliged to make the hard decisions it has avoided articulating over the last few years. The Labour Party no longer will be able to use a set of accountancy figures that simply do not stack up in any real sense of mathematics that I ever was taught. These are the hard facts that will face the Labour Party. At least Fine Gael has shown some realism, although I do not agree with all its policies, but the Labour Party is living in absolute fantasy land. It tries to persuade people that there are a lot of easy answers that simply do not exist in any real world.

A second point that it is important for the two Opposition parties to clarify is whether they propose that existing senior tier 1 bondholders in banks are not to be paid back the money. I believe that had the Government followed that path, bad and all as our problems now are, they would have been much more serious than they are today. It is about time the Opposition made it clear exactly what is its policy.

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