Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Thousands of individuals and families throughout Ireland are this week receiving letters from Revenue detailing estimates of their local property tax liabilities. Many families are struggling on low incomes and cannot pay their mortgages, yet they are none the less expected to pay the property tax. The Government has decided that families with a gross weekly income of anything above €480 are not allowed to defer their liabilities. Anyone who genuinely cannot afford to pay will be hit with a penalty interest of 8% per annum.

This tax is deeply unfair and fails in any meaningful way to take an inability to pay into account. Today, we learned that seven out of the eight people living in unfinished housing estates who were exempt from last year's household charge would be required to pay this property tax. The number of people in unfinished developments who are exempted has dropped spectacularly from 43,000 to 5,000 simply because the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government instructed local authorities to visit every unfinished development and identify which houses should pay.

What people want above all else is fairness and consistency. A family that lives in an unfinished housing estate and is lucky enough to have a footpath outside the door and a working public light must pay the property tax, yet another family around the corner in the same estate will be exempted because its house looks out onto a heap of rubble that should have been a green area. This is a ridiculous scenario.

The Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government is using the National Housing Development Survey 2012 report to justify the dramatic drop in the number of people who will be allowed to avail of an exemption. According to it, there are approximately 1,100 unfinished developments that are in a "seriously problematic condition". The report outlines what must be wrong in an estate for it to fall into this category. The estate would need to be in a bad condition to qualify.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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The Deputy has gone over time. Could we have a question?

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Not all of the 1,100 estates will be exempt. The Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government has decided that exemptions will only apply to certain homes in a little over 400 of the estates in question. That is blatantly unfair. Can the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Rabbitte, justify the significant discrepancy between the number of estates that have been cited as being in a "seriously problematic condition" and the number of exemptions granted?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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This relates to two factors, those being, the improved performance in finishing previously unfinished estates-----

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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Where?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----and the application of a standardised nationwide methodology of assessment. Deputy Michael McGrath well knows the background to the property tax. He ought to, given the fact that his party authored it.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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The question is on the derogation.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The tax's purpose is to broaden the tax base so that the Government can avoid putting additional taxes on income and people at work. In terms of fairness and consistency, I am sure that the Deputy will agree that it would not be fair to require some citizens to pay while exempting others.

The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government assures me that it has gone through the estates one by one and taken decisions on their standards. I presume that the Deputy will accept that, if phase 4 of an estate is not commenced and probably will not be in my lifetime, whatever about his, it is wrong to categorise it as an unfinished estate. The established criteria, which are available for viewing on the website and set out the essentials that must be complied with, are transparent. As the Deputy stated, they reduce the number of unfinished developments that will be exempted to 421.

The application of the tax across the board must be efficiently collected. For this reason, the Government, having regard to the efficacy of previous collection systems, has allocated that responsibility to Revenue, which will enforce the law.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I will not use my limited time to go into the politics of this issue or of the promises made by Labour and Fine Gael on taxing the family home.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Go on.

Emmet Stagg (Kildare North, Labour)
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What about Fianna Fáil's promises?

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The promises are there for all to see. I raised the-----

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Deputy Finian McGrath will help. He knows.

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Remind the Minister.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputies, please. A limited amount of time is available.

Dinny McGinley (Donegal South West, Fine Gael)
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This is another legacy issue.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Please, quieten down. Deputy Michael McGrath only has one minute.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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I am sorry.

John Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Deputy Durkan should keep his blood pressure down.

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Has Deputy Michael McGrath ever asked himself why there are unfinished estates?

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Hold on. This is the debating Chamber-----

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Why do they always stand up and-----

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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-----and Deputy Michael McGrath is entitled to his point of view, whether Deputies agree with it or not.

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Deputy Eric Byrne is getting a bit upset.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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The Minister will have a chance to respond.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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This morning, we have again seen why it would be futile to elect another Government back bench Deputy in Meath East next week.

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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All of Fianna Fáil's buddies in the construction industry.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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This is what we get every morning when we ask legitimate questions.

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Hear, hear.

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Does Deputy Michael McGrath not like history?

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Neither does Deputy Eric Byrne.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I raised a specific question with the Minister, Deputy Rabbitte. It concerned the decision of the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government to disregard the report that he is using as a basis.

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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That is not true.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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According to it, 1,100 unfinished developments are in a "seriously problematic condition". It cites issues of lighting, water supply, wastewater, roads not being of at least base course level, footpaths and open spaces. It is not easy to get into a category described as "seriously problematic". The report is based on the returns from the local authorities, yet the Minister has cut the 1,100 estates to 400. Within each of those 400 estates, only certain houses will be exempt.

The Minister, Deputy Rabbitte, cannot claim that this decision is based on the report when it clearly is not. Grave inconsistency and unfairness are running through the way in which the property tax is being introduced. This morning has provided yet another example, given the way that those who are living in unfinished estates are being treated.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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I do not see how Deputy McGrath thinks he can leave politics out of it.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I do not see how the Minister can either.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The reason we have the unfinished estates is because of the chronic mismanagement that went on under the Fianna Fáil-led Government.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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It is because of Government party councillors.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Members, please.

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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Our councillors did not do anything wrong.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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Why do the Government party Members not keep digging?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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That is the reason-----

Ray Butler (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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What about the Galway tent?

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Hold on a second. The Minister is entitled to respond to Deputy McGrath. Will Members please afford him the opportunity to do so?

Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail)
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We would if he answered the question he was asked.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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That is the reason we have the legacy of unfinished estates.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Government party councillors control all the councils. They have for the past ten years. That is true.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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It is difficult to listen to Deputy McGrath bleeding for the citizens when his Government authored the property tax-----

Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)
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They were the executioners.

Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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It is a family home tax.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----and made it a condition that must now be implemented to comply with troika funding. It was a Fianna Fáil proposition. The party was in favour of property tax then and now because it is in the middle of a by-election it pretends to be opposed to it.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Hear, hear.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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That is not true.

Ray Butler (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Fianna Fáil is living in the past.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The report from which Deputy McGrath quoted is out of date. It was completed last summer-----

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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It is dated November.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----and the situation worked out since between the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and local authorities focused on estates one-by-one on the basis of certain criteria, for example, the installation and commissioning of public lighting, provision of potable water supply, provision of wastewater collection, treatment and disposal systems, access roads to at least base coarse level, including where required provision for parking, provision of access to the dwelling by constructed footpath, provision of open space capable of serving as amenity needs of permitted developments.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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They are the criteria for getting into the problematic category.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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They have gone through the criteria and decided that 421 developments do not comply with the standards.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The report states there are 1,100.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The 421 developments in question will be exempt but, otherwise, the local property tax, which Fianna Fáil introduced, will be implemented-----

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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It was introduced by the Government.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----because it is a requirement of the funding arrangement with the troika.

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister, Deputy Rabbitte, is in government.

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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It is a home tax, not a property tax.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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When the household charge was levied - the €100 flat charge on people's homes - more than 1,300 ghost estates which were not completed were exempt from the charge. What the Minister is asking the Dáil to accept – apart from setting aside the report which identifies 1,100 incomplete estates – is that in less than a year the number of unfinished estates has more than halved. He also asks us to accept that even within those estates which are still incomplete that some households enjoy proper services and facilities while others do not. It is a bit rich for the Minister to make claims of consistency and fairness when his argument is as patchy and ridden with contradictions as it is.

Will the Minister address himself to the thousands of people and families who live in those estates, who have had the stress and inconvenience of living in what in many cases amount to little more than building sites? Could he explain to them how it is fair for the Government to make a demand on them for a payment on their family home? He might also consider in his response whether it is reasonable that a single person, for instance, earning a gross income of €16,000, would be faced with a demand for payment on his or her family home, or that a couple, for instance, with a gross income of €30,000, should be asked to pay the charge on their family home. When he responds the Minister should bear in mind that those categories of person are not mutually exclusive. Many families and individuals live in ghost estates – building sites – who earn modest incomes. What about the Minister’s argument for fairness?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Sinn Féin is clearly disappointed that progress has been made on unfinished estates but that is the case.

Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
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That is rubbish.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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When the local household charge was introduced it was a holding arrangement and was announced as such at the time and a broad-brush approach was taken to the exclusion of unfinished estates. Since then, based on the criteria to which I have referred, and in arrangement with local authorities, the estates have been addressed one-by-one. I am sorry Sinn Féin is disappointed that the improvements have been recorded but that is the case. The exclusion of 421 developments is considered fair in terms of one neighbour being required to pay property tax and another being exempt. As Deputy Michael McGrath said, fairness and consistency must be applied.

Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail)
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Why is that not happening then?

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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Except by the Labour Party.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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I hope Deputy McDonald will also welcome the exclusion of estates built by developers who used pyrite and who built homes that resulted in extraordinary hardship and misery for householders. In terms of criteria that warrant exemption, they have been gone through with a fine-tooth comb and I regard what the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government has now published as fair.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The disappointed people will be not just those living in ghost estates – the Minister chose to discriminate between households even in those developments he argues ought to be exempt – but will be broader than that. The Government has applied a broad brush in levying the tax. It is the view of the Government that even people on social welfare and small incomes will be forced to pay the tax on their family home. The Government fails the fairness test. The Government seems to have a rather perverse definition of what constitutes fairness, but it is consistent because it has consistently gone back to the same set of people and consistently put its hand in the pockets of low and middle income families, people who are struggling just to get by and those living in unfinished ghost estates – polite language for building sites. It is perverse for a Minister, in particular one from the Labour Party, to offer in the Dáil rhetoric of fairness and fair play in that regard.

How does the Minister imagine families will pay the tax? He should put himself in the shoes of a family living in an incomplete housing development whose annual income is €30,000. Where will it get the money to meet the tax? How could the Minister suggest that in any way it represents fairness or equity for those people and their families?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The purpose of the tax-----

Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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It is not a fair tax.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----is to broaden the tax base and to bring property taxation in this country partially into line with the experience across Europe. We are virtually the only country in the OECD that does not have a property tax. What Deputy McDonald is concealing is her complete opposition to the property tax, which is remarkable given that up the road there is a property tax in Newry three times as large as the property tax being introduced here.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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It is a system of rates to pay for services.

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Could Sinn Féin have introduced that?

Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
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It pays for services.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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This kind of partitionist mentality on behalf of Sinn Féin is difficult to understand. How is it that it is alright in one part of the island but not alright in another part of the island? The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government consulted carefully with every local authority, told them the purpose of what it was engaged in and asked them to assess the estates against the criteria I outlined and we are aware of the result.

The opposition of Sinn Féin to any measure that seeks to rectify the difficulties into which the country has been plunged-----

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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Is just like the Labour Party in opposition.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Deputy McDonald, in particular, is very good at describing the problem-----

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The Government is very good at compounding the problem.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----but she is not very good at coming up with solutions. What we need, in these circumstances, are solutions. I would be careful if I was a member of Fianna Fáil, given the legacy of the problem we are discussing. It is remarkable that Fianna Fáil Deputies are prepared to put their heads above the parapet, given their connections to this problem.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister should remember that we did get elected.

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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Is the Minister going to talk about his own connections?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Of course, all one has to do is go out to the north side of Dublin and have a look at the pyrite-affected houses and one understands the Sinn Féin link to the issue.

Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister should answer my question.

Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister is trying to throw down the gauntlet. That is the oldest trick in the book.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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We are dealing with a legacy issue and we are seeking to deal with it in as fair and consistent a manner as we can.

Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein)
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It is a dirty trick.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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I would hope that at least the party that authored the property tax would now support it.

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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If those Deputies in the side show would stay quiet when someone is speaking, it would be a great help.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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I wish to continue in the same vein because the people are bewildered and are becoming more so by the hour. After all of the Government's bluster, reports and examinations, eight times fewer people will be exempt from the property tax this year. I can only speak for south Tipperary, where none of the unfinished estates has been completed. We did not get enough money from the Government even to put up hoardings around them to make them safe. This is a total farce.

People are reading this morning that if they are struggling with their mortgages, they will have to give up their health cover and their second car in order to do a deal with their bank. People are hearing that the lenders are going to get tough.

The Minister for Finance chaired an EU meeting last week concerning the situation in Cyprus and we saw how uncaring the response was. The Cypriots are standing up-----

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Which topic is Deputy McGrath discussing now?

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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I am discussing the topic of the Government's recklessness and uncaring attitude and I am referring to the Labour Party in particular.

Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)
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Deputy McGrath voted for a fair amount of recklessness in his time.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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The year 1913 was the year of the Lock-out and 2013 will be the year of the great kick out. That is what the Government is doing - putting people out of their homes - and it should be ashamed. I read an article in a newspaper today which detailed how a couple were locked into their home in Dublin, near the Minister's house. A bunch of heavies boarded up the house with galvanised steel while they were inside with a small child. What next, Minister? Is there no new low to which the Labour Party will sink? The party has now become not the mud guard but the mud flap and the mud is sticking. The situation is appalling. The Minister can wax lyrical-----

Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)
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This is Leader's Questions. When is the Deputy going to ask a question?

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputy McGrath, do you have a question?

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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When is the Minister going to stand up for the people he promised to defend? There is no point in blaming everybody else, including developers-----

Arthur Spring (Kerry North-West Limerick, Labour)
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Fianna Fáil and Deputy McGrath himself can take some blame.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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There are people in negative equity now. There are people who need a second car. I need a second car, as do many in my constituency-----

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Deputy McGrath, please put a question to the Minister.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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When is the Minister going to look after the ordinary people and stop putting them into penury? Will he allow them to have their second car to bring their children to school or does he want their children to remain uneducated?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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I feel like the people of south Tipperary after that because I, too, am bewildered. I am very hurt that Deputy McGrath should make such charges against me and the Government. The fact of the matter is we are trying to protect ordinary people.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry South, Independent)
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The Minister has a funny way of showing it.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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We are trying to put this country back on the road to economic recovery.

Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail)
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The Government is doing a great job so far.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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There cannot be any social services or nurses, teachers and fire service personnel in their posts unless we get the economy right. I do not think it is fully understood how grave the situation was when this Government took over. We were on the edge of the abyss. That is how serious it was at the time. Deputy McGrath referred to Cyprus and what is playing out there at the moment. I could not believe my eyes when I saw the leader of Fianna Fáil on television last night, standing on the plinth and talking about what the Euro group ought to have done in the case of Cyprus, in the context of the proposal with regard to private bank accounts. He seems to have forgotten that his Government gave away the National Pensions Reserve Fund when the troika came in here. Fianna Fáil gave away the National Pensions Reserve Fund. Deputy Martin's party gave away the Irish people's future pensions-----

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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This Government has raided private pension funds.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----as a condition of the bailout. There was no statutory measure accompanying that action. There is an awful lot of hypocrisy associated with this.

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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Deputy Rabbitte wrote the book.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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There is always an element of theatre about Parliament and I understand the posturing. However, at the end of the day, we have to get the economy right. We are seeking to spread the tax burden as equitably as we can.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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It is more than the tax burden the Government is spreading.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Some colleagues representing Dublin constituencies would say that people from south Tipperary and other provincial constituencies get a better deal under the valuation system than Dubliners. However, there had to be a valuation methodology settled on and the one chosen is based on market value. It is right that the efficacy of the collection system should not be in question and that everybody who is able to make a contribution does so. There is a system of voluntary deferral for those who cannot make a contribution as well as a system of exemptions. Those Deputies who followed the progress of the Bill through the House will know the details of that.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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I am merely trying to explain the situation. We all accept we must try to get out of the abyss. That is what we were told we were doing on the night we voted for the bank guarantee, but how much worse would the abyss have been? That is why I mentioned Cyprus and the uncaring attitude of this Government, which holds the Presidency of Europe at the moment. The Government does not care about what is happening to the Cypriots, whose private savings are to be robbed. Deputy Rabbitte referred to Fianna Fáil robbing the National Pensions Reserve Fund but his Government imposed a levy of 0.6% on the private pensions of ordinary people. Bankers such as Mr. Richie Boucher are getting away with murder. This Government promised to face up to them but has not done so. It seems that the big guys are escaping and the ordinary people are suffering. The Minister's party was founded in my home town of Clonmel and was supposed to represent ordinary people. It did so, ably, for many decades but now it has abandoned them and left them behind. I have not seen many Labour Party members canvassing in County Meath. They are afraid to meet the people but they will have to meet them. Ordinary people cannot take any more. They cannot afford health insurance, never mind being told to get rid of it. They cannot afford to get sick. The charges for buses have trebled and-----

Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Ceann Comhairle)
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Does Deputy McGrath have a supplementary question?

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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When is the Minister going to act on the mandate that he got from the people of this country? When is he going to fulfil the promises he made to look after the ordinary people, to burn the bondholders and to cut the obscene wages of former politicians and bankers, as well as serving bankers, as we found out this week? When is he going to live up to his reputation for being a hard man? I remember seeing the Minister on a television programme with the former Deputy Pat Carey, who is a gentleman. He had all of the answers that night but has had none since. He is an abject failure.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The fundamental answer I had that night was that what Deputy Pat Carey and his colleagues had done would put the subsequent Government into a straitjacket in terms of its freedom to make economic decisions for this country, and so it has turned out to be.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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Can we see the transcript of that programme?

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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The fact of the matter is that from the time of the bank guarantee in 2008 to the general election in 2011, 250,000 of our people were made unemployed. A quarter of a million of our people lost their jobs and the first priority of this Government is to put those people back to work. This is the first priority.

John Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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There is no sign of that happening.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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In order to do that, we have to get the economy back into balance.

Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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Two years later and we are no further on.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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That is the first challenge and that is what we are working on. There is no comparison between giving away the proceeds of the National Pensions Reserve Fund and levying 0.6% on pension funds as a contribution to the jobs initiative introduced by the Minister for Finance in the summer of 2011.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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There is every comparison because it involves robbing ordinary people.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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That initiative has produced results in the tourism and hospitality sector and elsewhere and it must be remembered that the same pension funds had been the recipient of enormously generous tax reliefs. There is simply no comparison.

We are trying to do exactly what the Deputy claims to aspire to, which is to look after the interests of the average citizen of this country-----

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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It is a funny way of doing it.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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-----to give sons and daughters an opportunity to work in their homeland again.

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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Hear, hear.