Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

When the Taoiseach returns following those discussions, I hope there will be an opportunity for a debate on the Greek issue. We wait to hear what the Greek Government will put forward. Both the Taoiseach and the Minister for Finance are clearly open to hearing proposals. Ireland has a good record in the approach it took. We managed to get debt relief through longer maturities and lower interest rates. That saved the Irish taxpayer a large sum of money and gave us the space to have a growth strategy which has got 100,000 people back to work. There is capacity to manage a deal, but a deal must be agreed with the partners. There must be a strategy with which everybody agrees and I hope today offers an opportunity to make progress on that.

On the second question, there was no side deal in respect of politicians. The Deputy should look at the Government's track record. On every occasion the Minister, Deputy Howlin, and the Government have made decisions to reduce payments to politicians, to reduce pensions and special payments and to give up severance payments that applied to politicians in the past. The approach to this deal has been the same.

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