Selected quotes from EU commissioner Charlie McCreevy, speaking in Dublin at meeting hosted by the European Commission, May 23rd last.
"I don't expect ordinary, decent Irish people, or anywhere else in the globe, to sit down and spend hours and hours reading sections about sub-sections referring to articles of other sub-articles . . .
"For God's sake, we'd never get anything done in the Irish or any other system.
"That's making a big thing about nothing. I don't think any sane, sensible person would be spending this weekend or next weekend going cover to cover, and no matter who would do it, there would only be a few experts in Ireland capable of reading it.
"Does anyone ever read a finance Bill, and would you understand it in the first place? What you would read would be the explanatory memorandum."