Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)

We are far more cerebral in this House and may need a little more time. I oppose a guillotine and ask the Leader to be flexible with the time allowed for the Social Welfare Bill. There are many sections in the Bill and many important issues to be raised. Everyone who wants to contribute to the debate should be allowed to do so.

Yesterday, last week and the previous week, I raised the issue of the mortgage arrears implementation strategy. Almost 10% of household mortgages are in arrears or distressed and the Government promised to produce a mortgage arrears implementation strategy prior to the budget. That has not been done. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, said he would do it before Christmas. Our recess begins tomorrow. Does the Minister intend to publish it tomorrow or will he do it next week? This is a serious matter and people need to know what the Government will do in response to the Keane report, which is now ten weeks published with no further action emanating from it.

I was surprised to hear the comments of the Minister, Deputy Noonan, yesterday when he took it upon himself in an interview with Bloomberg UK to tell the Irish people that any future referendum would simply be about whether we would be part of the euro. I see that as an over simplistic view of what would be involved in a referendum. I am not sure how the Minister came to that conclusion when the Taoiseach has told us that the detail of the treaty and the legal advice therein is not available to Government. Does the Minister for Finance know something that the rest of the country does not? If he does, he should at least tell the people. Will the Government give a commitment that, regardless of what legal advice it receives, it will proceed to a referendum on what appear to be fundamental changes to the operation of the European Union, the eurozone and the ECB? Are we to have a referendum and why did the Minister, Deputy Noonan, see fit to comment on Bloomberg UK and not to make those comments in this House? I have rightly made the criticism previously that Ministers should not give press conferences to journalists rather than put out their stall in the Houses of the Oireachtas.

I note that my colleague on the other side of the House, Senator John Kelly, has submitted an Adjournment matter on the issue of Garda station closures and restrictions. I suggest that he should not bother coming in if he is to be treated in the manner in which I was treated yesterday by the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter, which was nothing short of disgraceful. As part of that, the Minister interestingly informed me that — despite the 41 Garda stations across the country that are to be closed and the ten that are to be restricted, in rural and urban areas — the purpose of the change is not directly to save money. Therefore, the Department has not even costed the closures and it is not being done to save money. However, the Minister blamed previous Governments, right back to the 1950s for the fact that he has made the decision ——