Question No. 4.

The Minister has made his maiden speech.

We have had two cases where the Minister has proceeded to answer a following question before the preceding one was concluded. Very properly, the Chair allowed the supplementary, but allowed the Minister to complete the previous question when it could not be heard. I suggest that we should proceed in an orderly way, complete the supplementary on each question and then go to the next.

I asked for the co-operation of Deputies so that we might proceed in an orderly way. We are reaching a stage now where, when the Minister replies, he is told—and it is insisted, on—that he has not replied. There is nothing that the Chair can do about that.

Surely where the Chair has allowed a supplementary, he should ensure that the Minister does not proceed with the following question until this supplementary is heard? That is what is causing the disorder.

On a point of order raised by the Deputy, Deputy FitzGerald places his case on a claim that the Minister is not replying before supplementary questions are concluded. I should have thought that supplementary questions are concluded when the Chair so rules, not when individual Members in the Opposition so rule.

Exactly. That is my point.

If the Chair has ruled that supplementaries have been concluded, it is open to the Opposition by continuing to engage in a hassling chorus, to suggest that they have not concluded.

Thanks for the lecture.

If it is to be lectures, it might as well be even handed, otherwise we have eight or nine different judges on when supplementaries have concluded.

That is exactly what happened. Perhaps the Minister was not listening.

One could not but hear.

What happened was that a supplementary was asked and the Chair asked Deputy Fitzpatrick to wait until the Minister finished the following question before allowing a supplementary. I am suggesting that that procedure of the Chair in asking the Deputy to wait and allowing the Minister to continue is an incorrect procedure. The correct procedure would have been to ask the Minister to stop—

The Ceann Comhairle called the question.

——and to allow the supplementaries. That would be more orderly.

Question No. 4.

(Cavan-Monaghan): So, we have reached a stage that, when the Taoiseach is not here, Ministers can behave as they like.

On a point of order. I have patiently waited.