It is eminently desirable on an occasion of this character to reserve, as far as one can, detachment. Still I do not think the occasion should be allowed pass without drawing the attention of the House and particularly of the Minister's own colleagues to the nature of the speech he has just made. If the speech had come from another man I would have imagined that he had searched his vocabulary for the purpose of extracting from it and using the most offensive and at the same time the most unjustifiable language he was in a position to command. Coming as it does from the Minister for Defence, with his scandalous record in debate in this House, the language he thought fit to employ does not surprise me.
But it is a commentary on the purpose he suggests that he is trying to serve in the Defence Forces (Temporary Provisions) Bill. The purpose which he professes to serve is to bury the past differences, to eliminate bitterness and to provide a common platform upon which men who have parted in the past may meet again. In the service of that purpose he charges by implication the whole Opposition in this country and in this Parliament with being in a conspiracy with certain persons in England for the purpose of sabotaging the Irish Government and preventing them from taking the necessary precautions to maintain the supremacy of the will of the people in this country. From a responsible man such charges would be loathsome. From the Minister for Defence they are merely disgusting and grotesque.
It is interesting also that on this occasion the Minister has chosen to do what has never before been done in this House—that is, to make a scurrilous attack on Seanad Eireann. This House will note and remember that the Minister, who makes that scurrilous attack on Seanad Eireann, is himself at present on trial before the Committee of Procedure and Privileges of Seanad Eireann for what is represented as being a gross outrage on the privileges of that House. The Minister is at present smarting under the rebuke administered to him by the Chairman of that House and by the obligation that has been put upon him by the Cathaoirleach and members of that House to appear before the Committee of Procedure and Privileges to explain his dictatorial and tyrannical attitude.