Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has outlined a variety of reasons why the Government believes Fianna Fáil's mortgage bill should be read a second time by a committee.
Fianna Fáil wants to re-introduce a bill to give the Central Bank more power to tackle high variable interest rates on home mortgages.
This same bill was decisively voted down by the last government.
Speaking in the Dáil tonight Michael Noonan reiterated the view he vocalised earlier, that there may be constitutional issues in relation to the bill.
He also pointed out that there is an obligation to consult the European Central Bank on legislation of such nature, the central banks stated position on the issue, the importance of competition as a sustainable and long-term solution and the possibility that the bill may have "unintended consequences".
Mr Noonan said there was agreement several weeks ago in the "great rush to reform the Dáil" that all legislation would be referred for pre-legislative scrutiny.
He said it looked like Fianna Fáil was trying to "beat the deadline for pre-legislative scrutiny", by re-introducing the bill.
"It is a flawed bill and it badly needs pre-legislative scrutiny", he told Fianna Fáil's Finance Spokesperson Michael McGrath.
Mr Noonan acknowledged that the Government is a minority government and that "everyone knows" the Opposition collectively has more votes, which creates difficulties for the Government.
"However", he said "that puts an onus on the Opposition".
He said previously, the Opposition "could have a go", but he warned Opposition deputies, "if you have a go now, there's risk".
Much to the consternation of Mr McGrath, Mr Noonan said when the Fianna Fáil deputy republished his bill, bank shares went down by 10% across the line.
If you take the total of the Irish taxpayers holdings in the banks, he said the publication of the bill dropped it by 10%.
Mr McGrath accused the minister of "scaremongering".
The minister told Mr McGrath to go back and check the date, and said it was a "valid point", adding "I hope they'll recover", before he took his seat.
Sinn Féin's Pearse Doherty said the Minister for Finance was completely off the mark to claim that publishing the bill had an effect on bank shares.
He welcomed the bill and pledged Sinn Féin support for it.
He said the previous government "slinked away" from any issue involving the banks and "hid behind weasel words".
Mr Doherty said his party does support a role for the State in banking. and when the market fails the Government has a duty to step in.
He said it is a legacy of Fine Gael and Labour's reign that bankers were protected at all costs and struggling families were left to pay.
He said he remembered when he raised the issue in 2011 with then Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore and he opposed it.
Mr Doherty said that Mr Noonan made the same argument today and the Government has not delivered for mortgage holders.
He said that this issue must be brought to committee straight away and disagreed with a proposal from Government that this bill must be subject to pre-legislative scrutiny in future.
He accused the minister of scaremongering when talking about bank share prices dropping and the threat of fines being imposed by the ECB.
He said that nobody in the House wants to waste time by discussing, debating and passing a piece of legislation that will be later deemed unconstitutional. He said the minister needs to strengthen this bill and realise the new reality.
He reminded the minister that he said that he would introduce legislation that would empower those on standard variable interest rates.
Green Party TD Catherine Martin said her party would not be supporting the bill.
Ms Martin said the banks were deliberately overcharging families, who were losing up to €400 per month, or €100,000 over the lifetime of the mortgage.
This money was being unjustifiably taken from families, and stolen from the economy.
"This is not backing brave, this is attacking brave", she said.
She commended Mr McGrath for his bill, but she said it would not pass the constitutional test and should be withdrawn and resubmitted.
AAA-PBP deputy Mick Barry said they would be supporting the bill, but reluctantly so because it did not go far enough.
Mr Barry said the profit motive in banking is the root cause of a lot of the current problems.
