SEANAD REPORT:IT WAS bizarre that any group of politicians would say that they did not have an opinion or would not wish to appeal to workers to vote one way or the other on the Croke Park deal, Paul Bradford(FG) said.

He agreed with members of the House who had commented on the need to back the deal. Some had mentioned the disaster that had accrued as a result of the defeat of the “Lisbon I” vote. It had been agreed that had come about as a result of insufficient public knowledge and a total lack of political leadership. “In relation to the Croke Park deal I think we are still going down the very same route of politicians refusing to lead.”

Joe O'Toole(Ind) said the global mismanagement of the economies of the world had found expression on the streets of Athens. "Three people dead today. This is because people were not given a way of dealing with it."

The need to discuss the elements of the public sector deal in order to assist people in understanding it had been raised time and again in the chamber. There was a lot of misinformation about it. Many ordinary workers in the sector felt that they had no choice but to vote No.

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The Government made no apology for refusing to join in a disturbing public campaign to coerce people to give up properly acquired pensions, Minister for Housing Michael Finnerantold the House.

He was responding to a Fine Gael motion calling for the immediate introduction of legislation to end the payment of ministerial pensions to serving members.

A Government amendment asked, among other things, that the House note the Attorney General’s advice that the immediate and total abolition of pensions for a single category of pensioner would be unconstitutional.

It was carried by 31 votes to 24.

Mr Finneran said that if the Government were to go further down the route that had been mapped out for them by the media, there was no doubt in his mind that the quality of Irish public life would be undermined in the long run.