Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)

Deputy Adams said yesterday that anyone who interjected was an amadán. I do not agree. If anything I say is wrong, Deputies should feel free to interject or correct me.

I refer to the bank guarantee. The current Sinn Féin finance spokesperson said in October 2008, "We appreciate the move by the Government today and remind ourselves that it is a bailout by taxpayers for the banks." He went on to say that he intended to support the Bill, as his party colleagues did in the Dáil, when the vote was taken because the Bill was in the national interest.

We have taken €3.8 billion out of the economy in the budget. If we had burned the bondholders, as suggested by Sinn Féin, we would have had to go back to the markets because the National Pensions Reserve Fund would have been used up. Some €18.6 billion would have had to be stripped away because we have junk bond status. Germany is the strongest economy in Europe, but its bonds were not fully subscribed to-----

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