Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I express my appreciation to the Leader for allowing a three hour debate on the budget within 24 hours of the Budget Statement. For this reason, I propose to be obedient for a change and avoid speaking on yesterday's events. Until yesterday, I had not heard of "egging", a form of anti-social behaviour engaged in, I gather, by people from all social backgrounds. I will cite an e-mail I received yesterday in which a man describes the effects of a case of egging. It states:

What happened was that a 16 year old youth threw an egg from a car at my wife in a totally random stupid act. The egg hit her in the face and the shell was propelled into her eye, splitting her eyeball and blinding her for life. She spent nine days in hospital where they were able to repair the damage to the eye without removing it. However, the eye, five months on, is shrunken and it is very possible that, within 6 months, she will have to have her eye removed. This is all because some idiots think it's funny to throw eggs at people.

Anyway, the reason for my email is that they were able to throw the eggs because there is no restriction on the sale of eggs in shops. These kids call into shops and buy 24, 48 eggs at a go and nothing else. If shopkeepers took it upon themselves to refuse the sale in these obvious scenarios, it may do something to reduce the occurrences of these eggings.

Apparently, this practice is comparatively common and regarded as good fun among teenagers. I am not sure what the House can do about it other than to publicise the damage it caused in the case I describe.

To return to one of my hobby horses, Ireland should adopt central European time as it would give us one extra hour of daylight all year around. Progress was being made in this regard until Portugal decided some years ago to switch from central European time to Greenwich mean time. The reason I raise this issue is I read in a newspaper report this morning that Jersey will have a referendum on adopting central European time. I hope we will follow suit in the years ahead.