Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

As I have been saying for a number of months, the promises made about guaranteeing hospital services were probably not necessary in order to achieve the electoral success that occurred. They also promised to overhaul completely the EU-IMF agreement but that promise had not been and cannot be kept either. They promised not to put one more cent into the banks but that promise cannot be kept. They promised to resist in Government many of the austerity measures in last year's budget, but that promise cannot be maintained either, apart from reversing the minimum wage cut.

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