It is not.

I welcome this opportunity to brief the House on matters relating to international security and international trade. With the agreement of the House, I will share time with the Minister, Deputy Burke. The two issues we are discussing are at the core of Ireland’s foreign relations at a time of great turbulence and change in the world. We are at a critical juncture in terms of the trajectory of the war in Ukraine. This is a defining moment for Ukraine but also for the security of our Continent. The US-led efforts to …

No, I will not, as we have already had a very extensive process. Let me agree with the Deputy on one thing: the people of Ireland expect this place and the people who show up to do their work to start talking about the issues that matter to them and addressing issues around housing, special needs education and disability. What they certainly do not expect is this sort of immature behaviour whereby, if a democratic vote is held in a committee of this Parliament – a Dáil reform committee – people do not respect its o…

A Cheann Comhairle, I could do without the cacophony.

I thank the Ceann Comhairle. Let the people at home know that, in the next six weeks, there will be 90 priority questions to various Ministers. Sinn Féin will have 47, Labour will have 12, the Social Democrats will have 11 and those on the Government side will have none – zero. How is that fair? How is their democratic mandate lesser than that of Members of the Opposition? So, the reality is this-----

Let us deal with that also.

They are using my time. There is quite a bit I want to say on this. We have engaged extensively and we have also moved.

Sorry, but we did. The Deputy was not at the meetings; her leader was there. We have moved.

Not with me. We have moved. We had a position and we were willing to change it because, in fairness to the Opposition, it is important to listen. We did not go ahead with the proposal that would have seen Opposition questions during Leaders' Questions eaten into. Under these proposals, the Members opposite all get the exact same amount of time for questions to leaders. That is not their problem; their problem is that they do not want other people to have a right to ask their questions.

We live in a parliamentary democracy in which the mandate of everybody, in government and opposition, counts. In so many parliamentary democracies, including the one just across the water, of course government Members of Parliament can ask the head or deputy head of government questions. That happens in PMQs in the House of Commons every single week. So, enough of the hyperbole.

We have lots of hyperbole.

I have answered the question. We have had meetings, for dozens upon dozens of hours. We had a democratic vote in this Parliament of the people's representatives and now we intend to get on with the people's business. Deputy Carthy raised the issues of trade and tariffs. What he has done in opposition today is utterly childish. At a time when it has never been more important for Ministers to go abroad to represent this country in trade talks, in tariff talks, on Ukraine, on the Middle East and on issues the Deputy s…

I will deal with that now in a moment.

Yes, it does.

Is that a threat?

I will do my best. Deputy Carthy talks about the Moriarty tribunal. I fully accept the findings of the Moriarty tribunal and my party voted in favour of setting it up. However, we do not have to look back 20 or 30 years to find issues in respect of fundraising when we look at the Deputy's party. We only had to read the Sunday Independent last week.

Deputy Carthy asked me if I have ever asked somebody a question. Did he ever ask a former councillor in his own constituency,-----

-----former Sinn Féin Councillor Owen Smyth, what he meant when he talked about Billy Hampton, the man who left a rural cottage to Sinn Féin? Does the Deputy remember the €99,000 for the derelict cottage from the reclusive English millionaire? The former councillor in Deputy Carthy's constituency said that the money bequeathed to Sinn Féin by Hampton-----

-----was "a lot sweeter" than the Northern Bank robbery money.

When you put it in context, it is "a lot sweeter" than something like the Northern Bank-----