Liam Fitzgerald (Fianna Fail)

The Opposition should make positive, definitive and categorical suggestions and proposals to that effect. When Opposition Members oppose, one expects them to propose something different and better, because there is no point in doing something different if it is not better, or one expects that, having done something worthwhile in the past which they now see being dismantled before their eyes, they feel duty bound to challenge the Government. However, this debate is radically different from anything I have experienced in recent times, and it is neither today nor yesterday that I first frequented the Houses of the Oireachtas.

It has emerged that the rainbow Government was approached prior to 1997 to address the historical issue of institutional childhood abuse and did absolutely nothing.