Darragh O'Brien (Dublin North, Fianna Fail)

That is it, backed up by the Labour Party. However, there are a couple of things the Opposition will have to get straight before going to the electorate. They will have to have a plan. Fine Gael at least has presented some semblance of a plan. The Labour Party has no plan. They should try to agree a plan together. I would like to read into the record a couple of interesting comments made recently by Deputy Gilmore. On 12 November 2010, he stated:

We have to be absolutely straight with people. The politics of promises is over. I am not going to go around the country or whenever a general election is held and promise people that cuts made here or there are going to be reversed.

Two weeks later on 25 November 2010 he said:

If there is something that we consider to be particularly unfair then yes we will look at that with a view to reversing it. Yes, there are specific cuts we would address. We will take them one by one.

While Deputy Gilmore refers to specific cuts he does not mention what they are. Effectively, what we have from Deputy Gilmore and the Labour Party is probably the greatest evidence of hurlers on the ditch I have ever seen. I have been a Member of the Dáil for the past three and a half years and I have yet to see-----

See this speech in context