The Dáil didn’t conclude until 2.37am on Friday morning following a bizarre series of events.
TDs from Solidarity-People Before Profit, the Social Democrats, Labour and some Independents stormed out of the Dáil in the early hours of Friday morning, following comments made by Leo Varadkar.
Their departure came after it was proposed that from now on, every party should get one turn speaking first (albeit at different lengths) before the bigger parties start getting extra turns.
The smaller parties disagreed with this proposal, leading to a heated outburst from Leo Varadkar, who said that he was “embarrassed” to be involved in Thursday night’s proceedings.
He said: “What we’ve seen here over the last hour or two is exactly what has been wrong for too long. Very small parties who get very few votes in the election, dominating this chamber.
“I’m embarrassed to be a member of this chamber tonight because of the behaviour I’ve seen from some of the parties here.”
Controversial changes to Dáil speaking time rules were passed after a heated late night debate saw the Dáil suspended twice, a call to have an emergency debate on the issue rejected and a walk-out from some opposition TDs. | Read: https://t.co/fcGOazxkun pic.twitter.com/487e4IeXWO
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) July 31, 2020
Paul Murphy shared footage of the walk-out that took place after Varadkar’s comments.
Opposition walk-out of Dail to protest government stitch-up of Dail rules to sideline the left https://t.co/87rl84s4kn
— Paul Murphy 🏳️⚧️ (@paulmurphy_TD) July 30, 2020
Richard Boyd Barrett also condemned the government’s behaviour, saying: “Sickening stuff by government. They hoped to push through a dramatic attack on democracy to allow them to be both Gov and opposition in Dáil, late at night on last day of Dáil, hoping no-one would notice.
“This skullduggery is a small glimpse how FG/FF really run this country on all issues.”
The Dáil is not scheduled to sit again until 15 September.
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