Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

In advance of Holy Week, we will take no lectures from the hard left and the looney left who will not face the people.

This is a shambles. I lay the blame at the Minister's door. His colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy O'Brien, has engaged with me on many occasions. It is ten weeks today since the hotel in Roscrea was taken over and the Garda was sent to terrorise the people of Roscrea. These are good decent people, ordinary mothers and fathers. They had no objection to children, they just wanted their hotel. The whole thing was manipulated, supported and cheer-led by the looney left, as I call them. They got their answer in the referendum. The people are sick, sore and tired of them. Our own young people have to go abroad. There are 13,500 people on our own housing lists. What happened in Mount Street is a disgrace. The Minister decided to go to Japan. Timbuktu would not be far enough at this stage if he went there and decided to stay. Then the unfortunate people were brought out to the Dublin Mountains and given tents. Meanwhile, hired machinery was used to destroy their tents in the city. What kind of Christianity was that? The problem is that the Government will not stop the people coming in because the Minister wants to welcome them all from God knows where. On Lá Fhéile Pádraig, the day of our country's patron saint, the number of asylum seekers here reached record levels. The number is still increasing. Then we had the public relations stunt with what was done in Mount Street and bringing the people out to the Dublin Mountains.

I ask the Minister to please engage with people. He has not gone to Roscrea, Fermoy or anywhere else to meet the people. However, the Minister cannot hide from the electorate. Neither can Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Sinn Féin, Labour or the Social Democrats. They got their answer last week. People are waiting in the long grass for them because they are sick, sore and tired of them and their dislike of the Irish people. They simply have a hatred for the Irish people who elect them and who pay their wages.

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