TAOISEACH ENDA KENNY has claimed that Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams does not believe in his own campaign against the Fiscal Compact treaty and claimed that the Louth TD’s heart is not in advocating a No vote.

During Leaders’ Questions in the Dáil today, Kenny was subjected to a claim by Adams that the government was attempting to regain sovereignty by giving more of it away to Europe and was accused of reneging on Fine Gael’s famed pre-election ’5 Point Plan’.

Responding, Kenny said that the Fine Gael programme was “subsumed” into the programme for government as part of a coalition with the Labour Party, adding: “That’s the programme we’re following”.

Kenny told Adams he was the leader of the No campaign but had “no answers” as to how to close the €10 billion funding gap and claimed that a Yes vote in the 31 May referendum would lead to a “continued stream of investment decisions for our country” and “put our own house in order”.

The Taoiseach told Adams: “I don’t actually believe that your heart is in the No campaign because you see the impact of the lack of investment in other countries. I don’t believe you believe in your own campaign.”

Adams said that contrary to the 1916 proclamation, the current government had ceded sovereignty to the IMF, ECB and EU and warned that recent comments from ECB president Mario Draghi had indicated that more integration was likely.

Elsewhere, in a rare moment of cross-chamber agreement during Leaders’ Questions, Kenny welcomed a proposal from Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin for the Oireachtas to examine the role of media in Ireland in the wake of the BAI’s report into the defamatory Mission to Prey programme by RTÉ.

While Martin called for an Oireachtas Commission, Kenny suggested that a sub-committee of the Oireachtas Communications Committee would be sufficient and could carry out hearings, and report recommendations to the House.

“It’s a constructive suggestion that you’ve made and I take it to heart,” Kenny told the main opposition leader.

Translated: The Fiscal Compact rewritten in layman’s terms >

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