A Cheann Comhairle, there is a convention in the House and required by the House that where a Member misleads the House, he or she takes the first opportunity to correct the record. It would appear that the Taoiseach deliberately misled the House on a number of occasions in respect of a number of matters dealing with the deal with the religious congregations, and I want to raise two of them.

In respect of the matter of the exclusion of the Attorney General and his office from the critical meetings, the Taoiseach said otherwise on a number of occasions in the House. In respect of whether the terms of the indemnity were debated in the House, the Taoiseach said they were. For example, on 12 February of this year he told me that the indemnity was worked out in February. The Committee of Public Accounts was told that the officials did not start work on the indemnity until 19 April. The House collapsed on 24 April and there was only one sitting day between 19 and 24 April. The House was dissolved on 24 April. The redress Bill concluded on 10 April. Negotiations on the terms of the indemnity did not start until 19 April. How could the Taoiseach say on one occasion that the indemnity was worked out in February and on another occasion tell the House that the matter "was discussed repeatedly in the House"?

On the matter of the exclusion of the Attorney General, we know now from both the Comptroller and Auditor General's report and from the then Attorney General that the Taoiseach's statement on 11 February that "The Attorney General and his office was involved throughout the entire period" is untrue. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform is now an orphan in Cabinet, disowned by the Taoiseach and his Ministers and abandoned by his own—

Deputy, your two minutes are concluded.

I intend to finish my sentence, Sir. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform is now an orphan in Cabinet, disowned by the Taoiseach and abandoned by his party leader. Will the Taoiseach take the opportunity to correct the record, having deliberately misled the House on major matters with regard to this particular deal?

Deputy Rabbitte, earlier you accused the Taoiseach of deliberately misleading the House. I did not interrupt you because of the two minute rule. I am now asking you to withdraw the remark that the Taoiseach deliberately misled the House.

Are you serious, a Cheann Comhairle?

Yes. The Deputy knows the rules. If you have an allegation of that nature to make, it can only be made by substantive motion.

With the full sense of consciousness about what I am doing, Sir, I am claiming precisely that, and the facts would not allow me to draw any other conclusion.

Deputy, you would have to withdraw the remark that any Member of this House misled it deliberately.

A Cheann Comhairle, we know from the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform—

Deputy, we are not having a discussion on it. You either withdraw—

We know from the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform that the Taoiseach's statement that he, and his office, was involved at all times—

Deputy Rabbitte, you will have to withdraw the remark or leave the House.

A Cheann Comhairle, do Members on this side of the House have any rights? You are supposed to be the guarantor of rights on this side of the House and I was misled last February and—

Deputy Rabbitte, there will be no discussion on it. In accordance with—

—we had to wait for the Comptroller and Auditor General's report to bear me out.

The rules of the House—

You are now saying that I cannot put that to the Member who misled the House and offer him the opportunity to correct the record.

Deputy, misleading the House is one thing but to accuse a Member of deliberately misleading the House is another.

It is a statement of fact.

Deputy Rabbitte, you must withdraw the remark or leave the House – it is as simple as that. The choice is yours.

Are you saying, a Cheann Comhairle, that you could put a perspective on these events that the Taoiseach accidentally misled the House?

Deputy, the Chair will not get into a discussion.

With respect, Sir, you have and you sought to interrupt me twice.

No, Deputy. I am telling you that in accordance with all my predecessors, where a Deputy accused another Deputy of telling a lie, they always had to withdraw the accusation or leave the House.

I did not say that, Sir.

I am asking you to withdraw the remark or leave the House.

I did not say that.

I am asking you to withdraw the remark or leave the House.

I did not say that.

You said the Deputy deliberately misled the House.

That is what I said, and that is what he did.

That is not a lie.

Yes, and that is exactly the same as telling a lie.

No, it is not.

You have no right at all, Sir, to draw such conclusions.

The Chair has ruled on the matter, Deputy. The choice is yours.

You are making a new rule.

A Cheann Comhairle—

Deputy, you either withdraw the remark or leave the House.

A Cheann Comhairle, you have put me in an entirely invidious position.

Deputy, you know the rules. You are here a long time. All my predecessors have ruled in exactly the same way.

To be honest, Sir, I have never been harassed by any of your predecessors in the same fashion that you harass me.

The Deputy is not being harassed. The Chair has been more than lenient in allowing you to discuss the matter at all.

A Cheann Comhairle, this is a matter affecting €800 million to €1 billion of taxpayers' money and you will not permit the Taoiseach to answer the charge.

Deputy, you will withdraw the remark or you will leave the House.

Could the Deputy re-phrase the remark?

Deputy Rabbitte, you will withdraw the remark unequivocally or you will leave the House.

The objective fact of the matter is that the Taoiseach misled the House, and I will leave it at that.

Deputy, you are withdrawing the remark that he deliberately mislead the House.

The Deputy is withdrawing the word "deliberately".

He is withdrawing the remark that the Taoiseach deliberately misled the House.

But not the suggestion.

What I have said, Sir, is that the objective fact is that the Taoiseach misled the House and I am prepared, in deference to your persistence, to leave it at that.

To withdraw the remark.

On the two aspects, I did not mislead the House. I have made this point already. Deputy Rabbitte quoted the start of what I said on 11 February, and he quoted me correctly as saying the Attorney General and his office were involved throughout the period. That was the first line. As Deputy Rabbitte knows, this is a stand alone in its own right, and might suggest a direct contradiction. However, if one reads the whole paragraph, which I intend to do, it is quite clear that I pointed out to the House that the former Minister, Deputy Woods, and the Secretary General held meetings in which the Attorney General was involved. I would like to read the full paragraph if I may and not the cynically edited extract the Deputy raised. On 11 February I stated:

If the party leader will allow me to reply. He does not need any help from Deputy Ryan. The Attorney General and his office was involved throughout the entire period. All of the issues of the indemnity came fully in front of the Government. Deputy Woods who was then the Minister for Education and Science dealt with the issues on the authority of the Government. All of the Departments were involved in most of the discussions. When Deputy Woods and his Secretary General and one of his officials dealt with the meetings they did not need anyone holding their hands. He did as any Minister would.

I made it quite clear the Attorney General was not at all the meetings, so I did not mislead the House deliberately, or in any other way. Deputy Rabbitte picked one line in one paragraph but he left out the rest. I am afraid Deputy Rabbitte knows that is not even clever, never mind smart.

On the issue of whether the matter was discussed on other occasions, it was discussed. I put that on the record last week. It was discussed in the Dáil on 12 and 20 February and on 8 March in the Seanad and on other occasions the matter was referred to. That was made clear last week and I will go through the quotes if necessary, but the Deputy has them, as he has the full quote of the last part. The document or the agreement on the indemnity was drawn up on 30 January and it was effectively agreed then.

That is not true.

Deputy Shortall, we cannot hear potential leaders. Only Deputy Rabbitte is entitled to ask a question.

The workings continued on until June. There are plenty of documents on the issue. As always when I raise this matter with Deputy Rabbitte, I remind him that the sole motivation of the Government was to help the victims and not put them in a position where they had to go to courts and fight cases in the courts one by one and where they would not have got proper redress. To send old people, who had been badly treated by successive Governments, to the courts and not allow them to put their cases, is, and will remain, the central issue. I cannot understand why people want to ignore that.

On that last point on helping the victims, the Taoiseach's Government deliberately collapsed the Laffoy commission. I do not know how that is helping the victims. For a number of weeks since this controversy developed, the Taoiseach and some of his Ministers have been saying that the previous rainbow Government declined to meet the people concerned or their organisations. It is completely untrue. The organisations came into existence after the "States of Fear" programme when the Taoiseach's Government was in office. If anybody is trying to be clever, it is the Taoiseach. He is the one who clearly told the House last February, at a time when we did not have the benefit of the Comptroller and Auditor General's report, when on four successive days I raised this matter, that – it is in black and white – the "Attorney General and his office was involved throughout the entire period". That is the Taoiseach's statement. That is the sense of everything he tried to say until the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform broke cover. The Taoiseach has now left him swinging from a lamp-post, disowned, abandoned and contemplating his future. That is the reality.

As regards the terms of the indemnity, how can the Taoiseach seriously say to this House it was referred to? That is the way we do business – by referring to it. Mr. Boland of the Department of Education and Science told the Committee of Public Accounts that it did not start to negotiate the terms of the indemnity until 19 April. The Taoiseach has tried to say to my colleague, Deputy Shortall, that the document was presented in January. The Department did not look at or start to deal with the terms of the indemnity until 19 April 2002 and the Taoiseach dissolved the House on 24 April 2002. The redress Act had concluded its passage through both Houses on 10 April 2002. How could we possibly have debated the terms of the indemnity and how can the Taoiseach stand over this way of doing business when he also told this House that there was a record of all meetings? There is no record, contemporaneous notes or transcripts of the critical meetings of 7 November and 7 January, which the Taoiseach knows.

I have already given the quote of 12 February where I made it absolutely clear that there were meetings. As far as I recall from looking at the record last week, there were 16 meetings in all. The then Attorney General was involved in 12 of the meetings and was not involved in four of them. We know his office would have liked to have been at all the meetings but—

Allow the Taoiseach to speak without interruption.

—because the talks had broken down at that stage, the Secretary General and the Minister were endeavouring to get the issues back on track. The Deputy is wrong to say the Laffoy commission has been pulled down. The Laffoy commission is completing its report. Then Mr. Seán Ryan, SC, will take over to continue the work. In the meantime, most of the aspects of the commission, other than the investigation end, are working successfully and well. I do not agree with any of the contentions made by Deputy Rabbitte. The key issue in this matter is to work this agreement successfully through so that the individuals will be entitled to their claims.

I do not want to get into an argument about a former Member of the House and I will not mention the then Minister of State's name. However, I will remind Deputy Rabbitte that there were four attempts to have a meeting with the then Minister of State. The programme that RTE started, for Deputy Rabbitte's information, was in the spring of 1996. I was not Taoiseach in the spring of 1996. That was the first RTE programme when this issue started and it was not when I was Taoiseach.

That was a different television programme.

On a point of order, what are my rights, a Cheann Comhairle, as a Member of the House—

The Deputy has no rights.

If the Deputy wishes to come to the office of the Ceann Comhairle, they will be discussed with you. I call on Deputy Ó Caoláin.

What are my rights when a Member of the House denies the record? What are my rights as a Member of the House?

We will not discuss the Deputy's rights here. Deputy Rabbitte is being disorderly. I call on Deputy Ó Caoláin.

I am trying to assert my rights in the House.

If the Deputy is not happy with Standing Orders, he knows the way to change them. I call Deputy Ó Caoláin.

When somebody denies the written record what is one supposed to do in a parliamentary context?

The Chair has no control over this. As the Chair has explained, if the Deputy is not satisfied with replies—

Can the Ceann Comhairle quote the Standing Order to which he is referring?

I call Deputy Ó Caoláin.

This is grossly unacceptable.

I call on Deputy Ó Caoláin. I want to get on with the proceedings.

Yes, I know the Ceann Comhairle does. I know exactly what he is trying to do.

There is no regard for the truth.