David Norris (Independent)

It was a racist caricature and she should be ashamed of herself for describing us as beggars, cheats, liars and thieves. Is that the language used by a good neighbour? In spite of its not being so, Ms Toynbee's view is widely held underneath the soft parlance of the British Conservative Party.

With regard to Mr. Chopra, in one jump we seem to have gone from snip to chop. His emollient tones did not fool me one bit, including comments to the effect that we were brave little soldiers and that the Irish had character. Why the hell should we accept the interest rate offered? We should be given the money by those concerned at a rate of 1% because we are saving their bacon.

I hope to God someone from the ECB reads this debate. The ECB flooded the market with cheap money. It did not care where that money went and, of course, it went into our half-baked banks. The ECB was then among those who carried out stress tests on those banks and it informed everyone that they were perfectly all right. Who is the ECB fooling? Why should taxpayers who had no part in what happened be penalised and placed in penury?