Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent) | Oireachtas source

It seems to me that what is happening in the Dáil this evening is a microcosm of what has been happening in Irish politics for a very long time. We are debating the creation of a Government, which is possibly the most important thing we could be debating in the next five years. We have curtailed debate on that to 30 minutes. We curtailed the speeches to five minutes and other speeches to three minutes. We plead that we do not have time to discuss this issue for some reason which I do not understand. We have not been meeting or sitting, but if we were serious about what is happening here today, we would have given far more time to far more people to thrash out what is really happening.

Those who have said that what is happening in Government Buildings and in the Fianna Fáil offices is a charade are utterly wrong in doing so. We in the Independent Alliance do not want any plaudits from the Taoiseach or anybody else for going to meetings to discuss the formation of a Government. We regard that as a duty which was given to us by the electorate and we are simply responding to their call. It is difficult. I applaud Deputy Eamon Ryan and Deputy Catherine Martin of the Green Party who attended those meetings for a while. Deputy Ryan then decided, for reasons of his own, that he was probably not going to get out of it what he wanted or that it would not work in the way he wanted. At least, however, he attended, contributed and made an effort. It is not easy for any of us to talk to those people who, weeks beforehand, we had opposed. They had said things about us, and we about them, which are difficult to swallow in a short time. That was our duty and it is what we have done and are doing. It is an extraordinary situation for Sinn Féin to call this a charade. I congratulate that party, however, on being able to form a Government with the DUP in Northern Ireland. I think that is an appropriate response to what that party's Members are saying about what is going on today.

Those talks are not easy. While I agree with those who have said that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have not made that visionary jump - they are conservative parties by their very nature and may be incapable of making that visionary jump which is necessary - they have moved and are trying at least to take on the message. The response has been inadequate so far but the message is being delivered that unless they cross that Rubicon, we cannot contribute to the formation of a Government.

We are pledged to take this process the extra mile. If it fails, it fails but we are determined to fulfil what the electorate has asked us to do, which is to introduce a new and radical element into Irish politics which has never been seen before.

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