Regina Doherty (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On a point of order, I recognise I am new here and things are being espoused in my name which I am not even sure were requested. This is the logic of my brain. I do not know how Members can say they disagree with the proposed Order of Business without saying they would rather talk about something else or proposing an alternative Order of Business. That leads to the practice we have always had whereby Members raise other issues. I do not believe Standing Order 16 applies to special sittings in a different way from ordinary sittings. I really believe in the mantra of giving respect and getting respect. With the greatest respect to Members I must point out that we are now an hour into discussing what we want to discuss. We have not even really started discussing the Order of Business. Unless we come to an agreement in the next few minutes I do not know how we will proceed. We will get to the end of the time allocated to the Order of Business without agreeing on an Order of Business. We will end up with proposals before the House to which I will unfortunately not be able to accede. That is not because I disagree with some of the comments made today. It is because I do not have access to a Chamber where we could vote tomorrow or on Monday. More important, I do not have access to a Minister in order to proceed with the legislation tomorrow or on Monday. I wonder if we could all agree that we have not gotten off to a great start.