Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

Unfortunately, we had evidence of Ministers not turning up at meetings in Brussels, departing quickly and not doing their job in the interests of the country as one would assume. It is important to set out clearly the changed situations in the context of the diplomatic interaction or onslaught and to express to those people that we are serious in our resolve to deal with our country's problems, to explain the strategy of making decisions in respect of the larger issues such as the banks, the deficit, employment and so on and to show them that things are not the way they were and that we have every intention of moving to a point where this country goes back up the ladder to be among the top five again. This is the reason why the Tánaiste has been so vigorous in following through what may be reasonably normal meetings but with a rather different and changed agenda.

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