Dan Boyle (Green Party)

I represented my party in a series of meetings held by Commissioner Rehn this morning and heard clearly what he was saying. I presume he said the same thing to all of the political parties. He stressed the need for consensus. I am sorry if I am breaking a principle, but I disagree with what Senator Alex White said. My understanding of consensus is not, "You tell us what you are going to do and we will tell you whether we agree". Consensus is about recognising the nature of the problem and making suggestions to solve it. It is about deciding how problems can be dealt with collectively. That is what we are lacking in the political system. We should contrast what is happening in the country with what happened recently in Portugal which is facing similar problems. The main Portuguese political parties held talks which broke down initially but then resumed and a budget was presented. The Opposition party abstained to allow the budget to go through in the national interest. That is what consensus is, but we are still a long way from this.