Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Anti-Austerity Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I wish to respond to the point about democracy. It is utterly cynical to attempt to portray a vote by workers in favour of, for example, the Lansdowne Road agreement as an endorsement that the Minister can now use to justify the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, legislation, considering that FEMPI existed previously. FEMPI existed in order to act as a gun to the head of workers and unions and to create pressure on them to vote in favour of the deals. That was its explicit purpose. FEMPI is fundamentally anti-democratic, as is the way it is being processed. The intention is to cut across democracy. The way it is being dealt with in this House and the fact that we do not get a vote on the extension of FEMPI is fundamentally undemocratic.

FEMPI is also fundamentally misnamed. Where is the financial emergency? How can the Minister tally that with the statement by the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, that the economic recovery is now firmly established? Also, it is not in the public interest; neither the destruction of public service nor the undermining of people's wages and conditions was in the public interest. It was in the interests of bondholders and bankers, who got that money, and other private sector employers who wanted to benefit from a divide-and-rule situation.

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