Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Tóibín is in a technical group with people who are actually in the Government and have undoubtedly gone along with this charade, which is going to mean that, effectively, we have had no Dáil for three months. This is at a time when hundreds of thousands of people out there need answers and action from the Government to address their housing situation and issues like disability. Hundreds of thousands of health workers have also balloted for industrial action because of the understaffing of the health service, while section 39 workers are balloting for industrial action because they are being treated so unfairly and unequally. Yet the Government wants more time off. Why will we not be discussing the programme for Government next week? There is no reason questions could not be answered on the programme for Government that has been negotiated for weeks.

We have then taken the art of speaking out of the two sides of your mouth to a new and higher level. People are pretending to be Independent Deputies but are actually propping up Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. They are Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael in disguise and, in reality, want to be in the Government, supporting it, endorsing the programme for Government. They are writers of the programme for Government while they are then pretending to be in the Opposition. They are undermining not just the Opposition but the right of the people of this country to have a strong Opposition and to hold this Government to account. This is more stroke politics from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael in disguise as Independent Deputies.

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