The Opposition demanded a general election as the Government came under sustained attack in the Dail last night.

The Tanaiste's controversial remarks about Mr Charles Haughey and the Government's nomination of Mr Hugh O'Flaherty to the European Investment Bank were highlighted by speakers during a debate on a Fine Gael Private Member's Motion, which was scathing of the Government's performance on a variety of fronts.

A Dail statement was demanded from the Taoiseach on the claim at the Moriarty tribunal that Fianna Fail had withheld information from it.

The motion, which will be voted on tonight, refers to the "widespread public outrage" about Mr O'Flaherty's appointment and accuses the Taoiseach of being "dilatory and evasive" in dealing with problems concerning the former TD, Mr Ray Burke, and two serving TDS, Mr John Ellis and Mr Denis Foley. It also criticises the Coalition's performance on the economy.

When the debate began at 7 p.m. the only Government deputy in the Chamber was the Minister of State for Tourism and Sport, Mr Eoin Ryan. He was later joined by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, and the Minister for Health, Mr Martin.

Opening the debate, the Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, said: "I believe that an early general election would be in the best interest of the country. I say that because we simply cannot go on the way we are going now. It is too much for the public to bear. We need to clear away the agenda of sleaze and get on with the business of government.

"Only a new government can do that. Deputy Bertie Ahern and Deputy Mary Harney have nothing more to offer. They should go and go quickly."

Mr Bruton said that press releases issued on Ms Harney's behalf outside the House did not suffice. "If an error like this had been made by any minister when Deputy Harney was in opposition she would have been demanding the minister's resignation. She knows that well. She now seems to be a person of double standards."

Mr Bruton added: "The Tanaiste, at all times, speaks as a member of the Government. If she makes a comment that has damaging effects she, as someone appointed by this House, must be accountable to this House. Today, the Tanaiste seems to be hiding from this House and slipping furtively into Cabinet meetings to avoid the media.

"The Tanaiste made a grave political error. It is tragic for her. She is somebody who has pursued the issue of accountability in politics with sincerity and consistency. Accountability has been one of the foundation concepts of her party.

"But the Tanaiste herself must be accountable to this House for her own words and actions. Actions and words have consequences. That is what accountability is about. In regard to her damaging remarks on Mr Haughey, the Tanaiste must now apply to herself here in the House the doctrine of accountability which she has so often applied to others."

Mr Bruton said that a Government which breached Cabinet procedures in making important appointments to a European post was not a good Government.

"A Government that appointed Ray Burke as one of its members, and then blamed the Opposition when he eventually had to resign, is not a good Government. A Government that prevaricated over the position of Deputies Foley and Ellis on committees, for which they were wholly unsuitable, is not a good Government.

"A Government that has inflation running at three times the EU average is not a good Government. A Government that has seen house prices increased by 70 per cent since it came into office is not a good Government."

The Fine Gael spokesman on finance, Mr Michael Noonan, said that if the House was a court the Government would be accused of criminal negligence.

"The canker of inflation is threatening the rose of growth, and while the Minister for Finance, like King Canute, commands the rising tide to stop, the Tanaiste, in an excursion into the past, draws on the failed policies of yesteryear and seeks to keep prices down by order."

The Labour leader, Mr Ruairi Quinn, said: "Fianna Fail and the PDs may well limp over the line on Friday, battered and bedraggled, looking like a group of out-of-condition athletes who had just run two marathons, but what is beyond doubt is that the days of this Government are well and truly numbered."

He added that only a general election could clear the air, reestablish the authority of the political system and give the State a new government with a fresh mandate.

"Not since the last days of the Haughey administration have we had a Government in such disarray. Not for years have we had a Taoiseach, Tanaiste and Minister for Finance displaying such arrogance and contempt for the Dail and for public opinion. Rarely before have we had a Government so desperate to reach the refuge of a long summer recess."

Mr Quinn said that Mr O'Flaherty's nomination, and the Government's response to it, came to symbolise all that was worst about the current administration, "the lack of judgment, the arrogance, the refusal to accept that they can do any wrong, the refusal to take any heed of public opinion, the refusal to answer the Dail, the absence of any sense of solidarity between the two parties and the back-stabbing within and between the two parties.

"The O'Flaherty affair has also galvanised public opinion and transformed a sense of doubt and unease about this Government into absolute distrust and contempt."

He continued: "According to the Progressive Democrats' sense of values, the late Brian Lenihan's misjudged, unsuccessful telephone call to the president, and his befuddled handling of the controversy when it broke 10 years later, was a matter that demanded his resignation as Tanaiste and minister.

"But reckless and irresponsible comments by Deputy Harney, which have seriously jeopardised the prospect of former Deputy Haughey ever standing trial, are not even worthy of a public response from the Tanaiste or a statement to this House, never mind a resignation from office."

Mr Quinn said that lawyers for the Moriarty tribunal had now said that Fianna Fail withheld crucial information relating to a donation ahead of the media disclosure of last week.

"There is hardly a more serious charge that could be made against any member of this House than the deliberate withholding of information from a tribunal. But for such a charge to be made against the head of government, who has sought to take personal credit for establishing the tribunals, is doubly serious."

Mr Quinn said that Mr Ahern's "tawdry" record as Taoiseach had left him without a moral leg to stand on. "In his three years in office his response to virtually every controversy and question has been characterised by evasion, equivocation, half-truths, dodging and weaving and, in particular, a failure to be upfront and open with the Dail."