by Alan Jacques
FINANCE Minister Michael Noonan has been criticised for his failure to attend two days of meetings of Eurozone finance minsters to discuss the chaos evolving in global markets.
Sinn Fein General Election candidate for Limerick City, Cllr Maurice Quinlivan, said Mr Noonan was “out-doing Fianna Fail with election promises as a new global crisis was developing”.
“Global markets are in financial meltdown, and an appropriate coordinated response at EU level is required urgently. Rather than acknowledge this crisis, the Minister decided to stay at home, pretending that there’s nothing to worry about.
“To be fair the Minister is being consistent — he has consistently failed to stand up for Irish interests at EU level. Perhaps the lowest point in his term of Finance Minister was his failure to support debt relief for the Greek people at EU level and get debt relief for Irish people too.”
A spokesman for Minister Noonan said that he would not be commenting on Cllr Quinlivan’s “allegations”.
