Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan has said his brother was only joking when he criticised him for 'indiscriminate' cuts in Government spending.
Junior Minister Conor Lenihan yesterday claimed that his brother, Brian, had an axe for cutting public spending, which he sometimes wielded indiscriminately.
In the Dáil today Labour leader Eamon Gilmore urged the Minister to lay down the axe in the interests of health and safety among the Government.
Brian Lenihan told the Dáil that his brother had made it clear that he was speaking in a 'jocose' sense.
Meanwhile, Minister Brian Lenihan has said that there will be no extra budget this year and that no date had been set yet for the budget in early December.
Brian Lenihan also told the Dáil that no new legislation would be needed to extend some aspects of the banking guarantee after it expires at the end of September.
