Niall Collins (Limerick, Fianna Fail)

I was in the middle of my contribution last night and I propose to share time with Deputy Dara Calleary.

I do not accept the double standards that are being applied. It is important for other political parties also to acknowledge their involvement. Mary Muldoon, a Fine Gael councillor, stated on radio yesterday morning that 50% of Fine Gael councillors took bribes. That was a reference to the "2 by 4" club and how regular meetings and lunches took place between some councillors and Frank Dunlop.

As a relatively new Fianna Fáil TD, I am confident these findings are being dealt with in the swiftest way possible. Within 12 hours of the report being published, the party's officer board met and decided to take action. Already, five individuals have resigned as members of Fianna Fáil. Even after acting swiftly, however, Fianna Fáil is being criticised for not acting sooner, that we should not have believed certain evidence when it was being given and that we should have pre-empted the final report. That kind of partisan commentary is lazy and immature. As a republican, I believe in fair process and firmly believe our party could not have acted on any individual prior to the final report being published.

It is ironic, therefore, that Fine Gael and Labour have yet to act on the recommendations of the Moriarty tribunal report even though it was published one year ago to the day last Thursday. When it was published the Taoiseach stated: "This report will not gather dust." That is exactly what is happening with it. Again, this is a case of double standards, particularly when at the time the Taoiseach stated "...to recreate political virtue, to rebuild public trust, to restore our reputation, it is no longer sufficient to do what is correct...we must do what is right".

There is no evidence of any such action being taken. It has joined the long list of broken promises made already by this Government. The Taoiseach, while welcoming the Moriarty report, was very careful about accepting the recommendations of the report and to my knowledge has yet to do so. I acknowledge the report was referred to the Director of Public Prosecutions and to the Garda but has either the Taoiseach or the Tánaiste accepted the recommendations and said so publicly?

The Fianna Fáil Party I am a member of will not tolerate or fail to condemn abuse of public office, whether in our own party or, as the Moriarty report revealed, in other parties. As a party, we have advanced draft legislation that seeks to implement the recommendations of the Moriarty report. I hope the Government parties will show the support for this legislation to back up their rhetoric.

When the Mahon report was first published, rather than concentrating on what the report said about Fine Gael members, Government TDs and Ministers rushed to latch on to comments made in the report about Cabinet Ministers in the previous Government. They were like a choir saying the previous Government tried to obstruct the tribunal. That was not a finding in the report. The reference did not contain any names. I do not believe there was ever any attempt by any previous Government Minister to obstruct the tribunal. There was a great deal of public commentary and political debate about the length of time and the cost of the tribunal but it was never anything more than that. There was no reference last week to the time the Minister, Deputy Alan Shatter, accused the Smithwick tribunal of trying to interfere with that inquiry. There was never any criticism when the Minister, Deputy Howlin, criticised the role of the independent Referendum Commission following the most recent referendum result. The selectivity is remarkable.

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