Speaker slams UNP

5 July 2010 06:44 am

By Kelum Bandara


Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa today said the manner in which the members of the main opposition United National Party (UNP) behaved during the second reading of the budget were unacceptable.

The UNP members had stood up and created a severe din in the House on Friday when the vote was being taken on the budget. The speaker also told parliament he would take appropriate action regarding the incident where a bottle of water was thrown by a government MP at opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe.

Shortly after oral questions, Chief Government Whip Dinesh Gunawardena said the UNP staged this protest after attending a discussion on the budget.

“It is unacceptable, during debates, we confront each other verbally but we have not seen such a commotion during a vote on the budget vote in the past. We ask the Speaker to take action to avoid a repetition of such unruly behaviour in the future,” he said.

Mr. Wickremasinghe in his reply said if the UNP had violated the decorum of the House, the Speaker could have named the particular MP or MPs and asked them to leave the chamber.

“Had the Speaker given such an order, we could have left the chamber. The Speaker did not give such an order. During the vote, a bottle of water was thrown at me. Water spilt on some of the important documents I had on my table,” he said.

But Mr. Gunawardena the Speaker had asked the UNP MPs to be quiet and sit down, but they had defied the Speaker’s order.