The Green Party has insisted the parliamentary party remains united following the high-profile departure of Wicklow Senator Déirdre de Búrca.
Ms de Búrca today announced she was resigning from the party and the Seanad with immediate effect on the grounds that the party had abandoned its core values since joining the Coalition.
Speaking outside Leinster House at lunchtime, Green Party Minister Eamon Ryan said party leader John Gormley was a strong and capable leader who had the support of the parliamentary party. Mr Ryan added the party was doing a good job in "greening the country".
Green TD Paul Gogarty said Ms de Burca had made "outrageous and inaccurate statements" but said he was not prepared to comment on what he described as the "real reason" for her resignation.
Mr Ryan and Mr Gogarty were accompanied by Green party deputy leader Mary White and Ciaran Cuffe TD as they made their comments.
Earlier, in a joint statement today, the remaining Oireachtas members insisted the party was “totally united” and would continue to operate in a “collegiate way”.
“We are disappointed by Deirdre’s decision. We are aware that she has been unhappy with her situation for some time,” the party said.
“The Green Party is about implementing progressive policies and improving our society. We are serving in government at a critical time for the country, and we have made tough choices that are vital to the peoples’ interests
“In government we have brought about huge changes in Ireland’s energy, planning and enterprise policies.”
“In recent months we have introduced civil partnerships legislation, a levy on carbon and a major programme of political reform, including a directly elected mayor for Dublin this year. Our policies have created tens of thousands of new, valuable jobs.”
The party said it would reflect on its position in Government if party members felt no progress was being made.
“Our position has remained the same since entering Government in June 2007. We have come to do a job and as long as we are getting that job done we will stay. If we are not making progress, we will think again,” the party said.
Minister for Food and former Green Party leader Trevor Sargent strongly rejected Ms de Búrca's criticism of the party, insisting her comments "were not a fair assessment of the party's performance in Government".
Mr Sargent said there was an element of compromise in every coalition government, and "that is the dynamic that keeps a coalition on its toes".
"We don't get everything we want but we certainly have got a hell of a lot implemented," he told RTÉ Radio One's News at One programme.
"We have worked in the interests of country, even if it wasn't to our own advantage at times."
Responding to suggestions that Ms de Búrca may have been disappointed by not being included in Máire Geoghegan-Quinn's incoming EU Commission cabinet, Mr Sargent said Ms de Búrca did, at the time, express interest in such a role.
He said Mr Gormley and Taoiseach Brian Cowen were supportive of the proposal, but he insisted it was up to the commissioner, an independent office, to make her own decision.
"It was not something that could have been guaranteed or delivered in the way of a party political position," he said.
Speaking ealier today, Mr Gogarty, Greens education spokesman, had expressed disappointment at Ms de Búrca's move but said the party remained united.
"There is no question of anything to do with John Gormley's leadership, and we're just, I suppose, a little bit shell-shocked and disappointed, but we are going to take our time to the allegations she's made outlining the reasons for her resignation."
Mr Gogarty said: "There is undoubtedly a human element to it, and although I am disappointed . . . and, I suppose outraged, at some of the comments that have been made [in the letter], I also feel she must have been feeling pretty bruised herself."
Describing Mr Gormley as "an intellectual at heart", Mr Gogarty said his party leader was a caring individual, "who gets frustrated at the negative coverage that sometimes he gets," adding: "John Gormley the person does give a damn, and that's why it will be very hurtful for him at this time."
Mr Gogarty said Ms de Búrca was not at as many parliamentary party meetings as she might have been at, and that the party would be rebutting the criticisms made by her.