And then there were three. High Noon in the House on Thursdays has mainly featured Tánaiste Joan Burton and Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald locked in deadly political combat. Yesterday, a third member of the Dáil entered the fray with a vengeance.

Socialist Party TD Ruth Coppinger, who shares the Dublin West constituency with Burton, was involved in a head-on confrontation at Leaders’ Questions.

As in the case of the Burton-McDonald political shoot-outs, no political prisoners were taken. Burton, with strong support from the Government benches, accused Coppinger of calling the gardaí “dogs’’ which she strongly denied.

Coppinger had raised the arrest of people in west Dublin in connection with the ongoing investigation into an anti-water charge protest in Jobstown last November in which the Tánaiste was trapped in her car for a time.

For decades, said Coppinger, ministers and taoisigh had gone around the country encountering hundreds of protesters, having their cars impeded and subjected to verbal abuse. They included Bertie Ahern and Charlie Haughey, she said.

“Neither of them, for all their sins, went and called out the dogs and called on a repressive police response for the behaviour they faced,’’ she added.

Government benches

All hell broke out on the Government benches, as Ministers and TDs seized on the reference to “dogs’’.

“She called gardaí dogs,’’ declared Fine Gael backbencher Ray Butler. He called on Coppinger to withdraw the remark.

“Have a bit of respect,’’ said Labour TD Arthur Spring.

Fellow Socialist Party TD Joe Higgins jumped to Coppinger’s defence. “Is it not enough for Labour members to be traitors to the working class ?’’ he asked. “Do not try to interrupt the speaker.’’

Labour’s Emmet Stagg repeated the Government charge that Coppinger had called gardaí “dogs’’.

In slow, measured tones, Burton said it was in the interests of the many gardaí, who served the country and its citizens with distinction, heroism and bravery, that she should withdraw the remark.

“I think it is important, notwithstanding that you are given to fairly colourful rhetoric when you speak here, that you should address the issue,’’ she added.

There was a chorus of “hear, hear’’ from the Government benches.

Burton found an unlikely ally when she said she had heard inappropriate language used against gardaí at many protests against water charges. “For once, the Tánaiste is right,’’ said Independent TD Michael Healy-Rae.

Burton heaped faint praise on Higgins when she said she had never heard him resorting to the kind of language used by Coppinger.

“What language?’’ snapped an unimpressed Higgins.

Coppinger insisted Burton had “made a pathetic attempt, relating to my using a figure of speech, to avoid answering questions’’.

She said, Burton would be “gone in the next election, and probably the entire Labour party with her, and so, too, will the water charges’’.

Kehoe rose to his feet and said it was beneath Coppinger to call gardaí “dogs’’.

Figure of speech

“I never referred to the gardaí as ‘dogs’,’’ she replied. “I was using a figure of speech.’’

Higgins again came to her defence, arguing that “in the English language we use figures of speech for impact and effect, and to drive home a point’’.

There is an extra edge to High Noon in the House, given the scheduled general election in a year or so. More blood will flow between now and then.