Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

-----because the Minister of State has to raise the finance for all the dreadful things that happened. The introduction of the Family Planning Bill was sought by Mary Robinson, supported by John Horgan and Dr. Trevor West. That happened here decades before it was introduced in the other House. We do not guillotine Bills. I praise, as everyone has done, the Cathaoirleach, the Leas-Chathaoirleach and the Leader who has been magnificent. In a sense, demolishing the House he has done so much to build up appears to be a strange way for the Government to treat him in this House.

I want also to say why I believe the Bill is unconstitutional. Senator David Norris has referred to it in relation to our Northern Ireland voters who are utterly annoyed at what has happened. I gather there has been no consultation with the Northern Ireland Executive. How does it regard this Parliament? Certainly, any of them with whom I have spoken have not been consulted. I will say in a while the reason they should have been consulted. We brought in here as a guest Professor George Huxley, an Englishman and a founder of the Northern Ireland civil rights movement who was recently awarded an honorary degree in Maynooth. He has seen the old Northern Ireland and is trying to build the new one. I think it was Andy Warhol who said every person deserves a quarter of an hour of fame. He said now that he has been mentioned by name in the Seanad of Ireland, it will be possible for him as a laudatur Hibernia, praiser of Ireland, to go with serenity to his death bed. We had a Nobel prize winner in economics. Everyone else seems to think it is a splendid house, except one man on his bicycle going around the Ring of Kerry.