Labhrás Ó Murchú (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Each day on the Order of Business the House receives a great deal of bad news. Personally, I find bad news very debilitating. Will the Leader consider setting aside half an hour on the Order of Business for the giving of good news? There is a very significant amount of good news. To give an example Senator Jim D'Arcy touched on Showcase 2013. It would be well worth everybody's while walking down the aisles in the RDS to see what is on display.

When we listen to the President of the United States deliver his inauguration address and subsequently the suggestion that he will come back to Ireland, possibly for the JFK commemoration, we know that the most powerful leader in the world is still thinking about Ireland. We know about The Gathering and we can see the momentum coming in behind this. It is not centralised, it is throughout the country, in locations everywhere in Ireland. We talked about our great progress in the peace process. I sat here for ten years during which we in this House were virtually crying into the beer because of the Troubles in the North of Ireland. Through the tenacity and character of the Irish people we made a breakthrough in the peace process.

It is the task of Opposition to hold Government to account. That is alright. I suppose we also play to the lobby outside but people listening to our deliberations would like to talk about the real Ireland. I visited Drogheda with Senator D'Arcy last week and all I heard about, in every place I visited, was the effort being made by the local community, not looking to Government for help or assistance but asking what they could do for themselves. They attributed much of that attitude to Senator Feargal Quinn who had been there. For heaven's sake, let us get our act together and try to be positive because if we are not positive here we will only promote negativity where there is already too much of it, too much suffering, too much worry. It is time we gave the leadership to lift all the boats a little higher.