Joe O'Toole (Independent)

Exactly, Senator White, exactly.

The removal of the groceries order is a bottle of smoke. I agree with Senator Dardis that the matter has been discussed ad nauseam but it will make no difference whatsoever down the line, none whatever. I was born and raised in my mother's grocery shop and remember when Mr. Lemass's Government introduced the dreaded turnover tax in the early 1960s. RGDATA hired out the local loudspeaker and carried it about the town, telling us that town centre life would never be the same again, that every small town would be closed and could not thrive anymore. It argued that life as we knew it would end. That is the current and abiding position of RGDATA. On the other hand, we have the view from the Competition Authority that in some way we can trust the likes of Tesco, Lidl, Aldi, Dunnes Stores and others to give us back the extra profits they are making so that we will all be, as argued by Mr. Eddie Hobbs, €1,000 per household, per year, better off. That is nonsense. If every household in Ireland is €1,000 per year better off after this, I will share my mortgage with the rest of the population.