Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The reason this should not be paid is because the people cannot afford to pay it. With regard to the Tánaiste's little metaphors about Sinn Féin, Sinn Féin is not taking on this debt and neither is the Tánaiste. The ordinary people who send us in here, those who do not even bother voting, those in all parts of the world because they cannot get a job here and the 500,000 people on the dole will be paying this. It would be far better if the Tánaiste just stood up and told us straight that what the Government has done is turned this into sovereign debt and pushed it up the pipe. It has passed the burden onto our children and grandchildren. This would be the honest and straightforward way of dealing with this as opposed to trying to spin it into something it is not. What will this mean for the average person who went out and voted for the Labour Party two years ago?

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