"Going back to the past and frequent recriminations will get us nowhere," Speaker Vladimir Seks said, reminding deputies that nearly 60 speakers had requested the floor and appealing to them to think of the future of war veterans and their families.
A heated debate was sparked by SDP member Ivica Pancic, former minister of war veterans' affairs, when he said that the government "has basically copied" the bill drafted by his party.
Several HDZ deputies responded by saying that their party had "erased rather than copied" the SDP-sponsored bill, and that the new bill would greatly improve the position of war veterans because the previous SDP-led government did not have the will to do it.
Rejecting Pancic's allegations, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of War veterans' Affairs, Jadranka Kosor, said that the HDZ had removed shortcomings from the existing law to ensure financial assistance to war veterans and their families.
Further responses were prompted by the statement by SDP deputy Ingrid Anticevic-Marinovic that Kosor had said that all associations of Croatian Homeland War veterans supported the bill, and that the minister was again testing "the HDZ's model of manipulating those associations".
Anticevic-Marinovic cited several war veterans' associations whose representatives had expressed their opposition to the bill.
Kosor resolutely dismissed the allegations, saying that all war veterans' associations but the one led by Tomislav Mercep had expressed their support for the bill during the latest talks.