Joe O'Toole (Independent)

When I heard the moral sermonising from these benches today about what might or might not be appropriate to debate this evening, I was reminded of my first year here and meeting somebody who I thought might enter national politics. He informed me that he had decided not to do so because he was putting his family first. It knocks one for six to hear moral certitude of that kind. It took me some time to figure out that to work for one's country or community is also to work for one's family. This idea of only having one issue or priority at any one time is what I call the "parish priest syndrome", namely, if one has to do two jobs in one day then it is a busy day.

My choice would have been to debate the Iraqi crisis this evening, but that does not detract from the validity of the motion before us. It was not from Dublin or Cork that the phrase "gods make their own importance" came. If we do not highlight the importance of issues ourselves, nobody else will. This is an important issue that does not have much to do with sport.

The last occasions on which I marched against the IRFU was in 1970. I recall speaking outside Lansdowne Road that day and saying that if these people turn their backs on the coloureds and blacks of South Africa, it is only a matter of time before they start turning on someone else. It took 30 years, but I was eventually proven right. It is now the turn of Connacht. To paraphrase Cromwell, it is to hell with Connacht as far as the IRFU is concerned at present. I never trusted that organisation. I always had doubts about it and what is happening confirms my feelings.