Fine Gael is to table a motion of no confidence in the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, ahead of what is expected to the toughest Budget in years.
This will be the first no-confidence motion in a Government Minister since the general election, and it will be debated next week when the Book of Estimates is due to be published.
The Fine Gael leader, Mr Enda Kenny, said yesterday that Mr McCreevy had demonstrated the kind of affinity for the public finances that Michael Fish demonstrated for the weather.
"Charlie McCreevy has been found out. Spending is now €1 billion ahead of the Budget day targets. Tax revenues are €1.3 billion below target. Even the manager of the local Christmas club could re- cognise that as a crisis," he said.
Mr Kenny said that if this continued the State was looking at budget deficits of more than €5 billion in 2003, rising to €6 billion in 2004. "That assumes, of course, that by some fiscal miracle, Charlie McCreevy will actually stick to his spending targets for those two years," he said.
The Budget, which will be presented in over three weeks' time, will be the most critical budget of the past decade, the Fine Gael leader added. "It will have enduring effects on families, on businesses and on our stability as a nation to continue to create jobs, to provide proper health and education and to support those who are disadvantaged," he said.
"Overall it will decide how we will live as a society. The runaway growth in public expenditure must be checked. This is the backdrop against which this Budget is being crafted."
Mr Kenny said Mr McCreevy was guilty of allowing spending to rise at more than 20 per cent a year, and of not knowing how much his tax concessions cost.
"He also fooled himself and conned the country with accounting sleight of hand."
The Fine Gael leader said the party was tabling the motion of no confidence because it believed that the man who had presided over the shambles was not the man for this critical Budget.
"He has done so much funny accounting, he has even managed to fool himself."
The Fine Gael deputy leader, Mr Richard Bruton, said a far greater offence was that Mr McCreevy and his Cabinet colleagues had critically undermined the capacity of the economy to cope with the present downturn by recklessly burning off the surplus that should have cushioned the adjustment.
He said the greatest offence committed by the Minister for Finance was not deceiving the public, but critically undermining the capacity of this economy to cope with the present downturn.
"More jobs will be lost in vulnerable industries because of their action as the necessary policies of retrenchment take hold," he said.
A spokesman for Labour said last night it will be supporting the Fine Gael motion.