Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am very disappointed with the Minister, mar níl sé anseo. I mean no disrespect to the Minister of State, Deputy Feighan, but I used to listen to a radio programme many years ago that was known as "Dear Frankie". The Ceann Comhairle may remember it. It seems Frankie has been put forward to answer everything in here. It just goes to show that the Government has no respect for this House. Members of the Government love to pay homage to the European bureaucrats, and the bureaucrats know it. That is why we are being penalised, perished and literally terrorised by these non-elected bureaucrats of Europe.

The Taoiseach said earlier in reply to Deputy Nolan's question about the situation with the selling of veterinary medicines by merchants, "Oh, it is a European directive." That is a reply he is good at giving. France gets these European directives and what does it do with them? It tears them up and puts them in the bin. We are the best boys in the class for obeying European directives. That is what we are good at, but we are feeble and inadequate in applying for funds, even those set up for recovery from the Covid pandemic. I nearly said "plandemic" instead of "pandemic" and I do not know whether there was not a bit of a plan. In fact, there is a plan in all of this, as I said a week or two weeks ago to the Taoiseach. Our country has given away so many of its freedoms during this pandemic. The last Fianna Fáil speaker invoked the anniversary of Seán Lemass. He was a great man and a visionary.

He is turning in his grave at such a speed that evolution and science would be unable to measure it. I thought the Deputy might go back as far as Éamon de Valera but he did not. I am glad he acknowledged that the national herd will be cut because some of his colleagues are saying it will not be cut, which is a pipe dream.

We are the good boys of Europe, the best boys in the class. A totalitarianism has crept into Ireland, especially in the past 13 or 14 months but also before that. It is the European plan. There is now talk of a green passport. That was planned in 2018 and there were meetings about it in 2019, ever before we had Covid-19. It is shocking and diabolical. We are supposed to be an independent state. I do not know to where our independence has gone. We have feeble leaders and representatives who will not even come in here to listen or talk to us.

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