David Norris (Independent)

Senator Donohoe made a very reasoned and fine speech. Unfortunately, the debate has descended since then. This is regrettable because the matter is far too serious. We have to learn to listen to each other, whether or not we agree. It is up to us to take the temperature down a little bit and apply reason to these issues. I regret that there was a headline in a newspaper today which stated that various people should be shot. These people have done appalling things and have landed this country in misery, but how would that misery be alleviated if some lunatic took up this proposal and murdered one of them? This is the kind of thing done by Republican Party members in America. They call for President Obama to be put in the crosshairs. Too many people have been subjected to violence. They should be subject to intellectual scrutiny, held to account and possibly sent to jail, but I do not think this kind of overheated debate is a good idea.

Somebody said that nobody has been right on this. Senator Boyle has indicated that he was partially right, and so was I. The figures posted yesterday were similar to those I put on the record, but thanks to the media, nothing I said was ever reported because I was not looking for heads and buckets of blood. None the less, I am constantly criticised. I got an abusive letter today stating that I am part of the corruption because I tried to take a rational and dispassionate view of things.

Mr. Peter Mathews is somebody for whom I have great respect and whose figures I have sometimes quoted in the House. Everything that was said yesterday, horrible as it was, vindicated what he tried to communicate to Members of this House. Will the Leader seek to make an arrangement to afford Mr. Matthews, who is correct in his figures and has not been partisan, an opportunity to speak to some of the people who are now guiding our economy? While I know he has had a brief conversation with the Minister for Finance, I would like him to be able to talk to Mr. Alan Dukes to discuss these figures, not in an overheated fashion but to see if there is a way forward because there may be. The country has been through such situations before. Political events affect financial ones. When the Irish Parliament was collapsed and absorbed into the parliament at Westminster, it was seen as a catastrophic event by many and it had an effect. Belvedere House, at the top of North Great George's Street in Dublin, was sold to the Jesuits in the aftermath of that event for about one third of what it had cost to build 50 years previously. That is the kind of haircut that had to be taken before, yet things recovered. I hope that in five or ten years' time perhaps this ludicrous amount of money that is being filched from taxpayers by these dreadful, misguided people who so foolishly embarked on adventures will come back to the taxpayer if these matters are prudently managed. They need to be prudently managed, however, not made the subject of mud-slinging and an ignorant debate.