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Good manners and a polite tone often are often absent when the Greek deputies hold parliamentary debates, especially when the dispute involves PASOK and New Democracy representatives. This time, two deputies personally insulted each other and as a result, the meeting of the Committee on Economic Affairs, which discussed the draft budget for 2012, was suspended.

Some deputies claim that their colleague from New Democracy Manolis Kefalogiannis threatened the chairwoman of the Commission Vasso Papandreou, that he would clobber her and she replied "Go to hell, you f..r. I accept threats from nobody." The bitter dispute began when, in his speech, the Minister of Finance Evangelos Venizelos accused the last government of New Democracy of having concealed the truth about the state of the Greek economy from the people and Parliament, before the 2009 elections, thus provoking the sharp response of the "blue" deputies.

For some time, the hall of the Senate became the battleground on which lawmakers from both parties "fought". When the deputy and former Minister Manolis Kefalogiannis once again interrupted Evangelos Venizelos, the chairwoman of the parliamentary committee made a remark. She advised him to keep quiet and let the Minister of Finance finish his speech, but she did not stop there.

Vasso Papandreou turned to the New Democracy deputy and said, "I will not become a bully like you. When you do not attend the meetings we have no problems" and urged him to leave the room. The reaction of Manolis Kefalogiannis was equally acute. He said, "This will not happen ... I will not allow you to treat me this way ... You have lost your seriousness, and if you are unable to hold the meeting, leave the chair."

There then followed a complete mess and the other deputies became silent witnesses of a previously unheard parliamentary dialogue. Vasso Papandreou continued the quarrel, saying that the words a person says in this room show the nature of that person. When the opposition deputy said that she was the worst chairperson of the Committee on Economic Affairs in the Greek Parliament she added that she did not care what Manolis Kefalogianis said.

The Deputy Minister of Finance Filippos Sahinidis took on the role of the "fireman" and asked for the exuberant dialogues to be deleted from the minutes because, as he said, "this dispute is unworthy of us." The meeting was interrupted for several minutes to take the heat out of the situation. When committee members returned to the hall Vasso Papandreou called on New Democracy "to restrain its deputy because he causes problems every time."

Manolis Kefalogiannis, in turn, urged the chairwoman not to attack him "personally every time." Later, in conversation with journalists, he said that he had not threatened his colleague in parliament with a beating and added, "I would never do such a thing because you should not hit a woman even with a rose."