Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)

On behalf of the Fianna Fáil group I absolutely condemn the brutal murder of a 16 year old girl last night in Tallaght. This type of crime is all too prevalent in our society. Another young lady was seriously injured. I wish the Garda success in its investigations - it will have the full support of this House and no doubt of the whole Oireachtas. It was a brutal crime and should be roundly condemned. I pass on our deepest sympathies to the family that has lost someone whose young life has been cut short.

Yesterday we had a one-hour debate on the new fiscal compact. While the business of the House was agreed yesterday and we have tried as much as possible to assist Government in having proper debates, everyone will agree an hour was wholly insufficient - I believe even the Minister of State, Deputy Creighton, agreed. She had no opportunity to respond to questions. We need to consider the length of time a Minister is allowed to contribute - that is no reflection on the Minister of State, Deputy Creighton, who was anxious to respond. I know another Minister was waiting to come into the House but I say this given that for the first three weeks after we came back in January we had only two sitting days. The House should set aside a full day to debate the fiscal compact in order to go through each section of the agreement.

The Minister of State and some Senators on the Government side have accused us of scaremongering - I restate that my party is a pro-Europe party and has always been. Even prior to the publication of the Government's Bill, the compact should be discussed at length. I do not mind whether the Minister of State, Deputy Creighton, is in the House for that debate, but we, as Senators, under the Lisbon treaty have the right and duty to scrutinise EU legislation. I have raised this matter repeatedly, as have Members on the other side of the House. In 12 months this House has not scrutinised one piece of European legislation. I would also say that we did not do so prior to that. It is a stain on both Governments since the passing of the Lisbon treaty. That should be core and central to what we are about here.

Yesterday the Minister of State indicated she would be more than happy to come back to the House to answer the questions we are asking and I am very pleased to hear that. When will that happen? I again ask the Leader to set aside at least a day to go through the new fiscal compact, the new EU treaty, prior to the Bill being published so that we can discuss the implications, both positive and negative and see all sides of the argument. When will this Chamber start scrutinising EU legislation and directives? We have the time to do it and I think the Leader will agree we have the expertise on all sides of the House to do it. We should be doing a service for the people. We should examine this proposed legislation in draft form and tease out what is good and bad about it and have a proper debate about it.

I will finish on this point and I thank the Cathaoirleach for his indulgence because this is important. Every poll in Europe during the past two years has shown that the public is disconnected from Europe. We have a role as legislators to ensure that Europe is central to what we do. I put it to the Leader that the most central part of this is to examine what laws Europe seeks to impose on this country.