Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am addressing the Taoiseach but I address my remarks to all of the party leaders, who have eventually and finally woken up. They were part and parcel of the problem all along for the past 12 months by not allowing debate, not wanting debate and shutting down debate. They were name calling people looking for debate, like me and my colleagues in the Rural Independent Group. However, now that it has arrived in the leafy suburbs of Dublin 4, the Government is putting up tents and fencing to keep people out. When ordinary people in Roscrea, County Tipperary, Newtownmountkennedy, County Wicklow, and all over the country, including now in Clonmel, attempted to have a peaceful protest and put up small barricades - not barricades as such, like the power of the State has - they were demonised, blackguarded and condemned by everybody here and their mouthpieces in RTÉ and other places. Now they have it, they will not have a debate. I want the Minister for Justice in here. The Taoiseach can shake his head all he likes. It is a fact, and he has the support of all the parties here - every one of them. Now they are getting it in the face with the local and European elections and they do not want it. It is now a topic they have to deal with because it is hurting them. They would not deal with it all along. They would not even have a debate in this Chamber, so a plague on all their houses.

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