Collaboration by France and Italy with the Nazis in the second World War was partly responsible for the non-emergence of a common EU line on sporting contacts with Yugoslavia, suggested Mr Paschal Mooney (FF).
Praising the Government for its moral stance on the issue, Mr Mooney said that, as committed Europeans, we were being let down by the politicisation of the situation by the French and the Italians, both of whom were taking no action to prevent basketball teams from Yugoslavia playing in their countries.
It was outrageous that our EU partners were permitting this to happen. "I suppose one should not be surprised when one considers the history of these two countries, and that Vichy collaborated with the Nazis and the Italians stayed on the Nazi side until they were defeated in the war. It underlines what seems to be a political agenda here. UEFA is copping out as a result of there being no consensus among the European partners on this issue."
An Opposition attempt to embarrass the Government backfired.
The Fine Gael leader in the House, Mr Maurice Manning, noted that there was a strange omission from the Order of Business. What had happened to the allocation of Private Members' time to the Progressive Democrats? He had waited with bated breath for several days to see what issue they would put forward for discussion and, with the passage of time, he had become even more exercised over how many seminars the party would have to hold to determine this matter.
To his great distress, he had been forced to conclude on Tuesday that the PDs would not actually table a motion. However, he had been relieved to read in The Irish Times parliamentary schedule yesterday that the PDs were reckoned to be still in business, according to the circularised information.
He said he had wondered if the Taoiseach's negotiating skills were to be brought into play to sort out conflicts within the PD membership on what they should actually debate.
However, the leader of the House had finally made it clear yesterday that there was no motion forthcoming from the PDs, said Mr Manning. This was unprecedented. Never previously had a Seanad group failed to reallocate its Private Members' time to another political grouping.
To reinforce his point, Mr Manning proposed that the Order of Business be amended to facilitate debate on the contentious Shannon River Council Bill tabled in the names of Fine Gael, Labour and Independent members.
Mr Joe O'Toole (Ind) said he shared the concerns of Mr Manning. In his 13 years in the House he could not recall a political party being unable to put forward a Private Members' motion in the allocated time on a Wednesday night.
The PDs had been set up as mould breakers in Irish politics. The mould was certainly being broken now.
Labour's Mr Joe Costello said his party would back the moving of the Shannon River Council Bill if the PDs were really unable to take up their Private Members' slot.
Pointing out that these things should not happen, but they sometimes did in regard to Private Members' business, the leader of the House, Mr Donie Cassidy, observed that it was election time. The PDs were very good contributors, voters and attenders in the House and he was proud to be associated with a Government in which they were participating.
On a vote on the proposed amendment to the Order of Business, the Government won by 15 votes to 10 in the 60-member House.