Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

What the Government and the Chief Whip have done amounts to downright blackguarding. Some 14 groups will have spoken in today's debate before our group gets to speak. If the experience over the past four years and before has taught me anything, it is that Government backbenchers have a habit of not turning up. The Ceann Comhairle is well aware of that, as is everyone else here. As I said when we last debated this, this is a three-card trick. We will not be able to know when our group is to speak. We had a situation where one group would speak after another. Now the debate will pass back and forth between the Government and other groups. This is nothing but a deliberate trap to trick us out of our speaking rights and silence us. We will be raising this objection every day.

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