Religious orders has been criticised for their slow uptake of a redress scheme for victims of abuse in religious institutions.
The cost of the scheme stands at almost €1.5bn.
However to date, the church has only paid just over €80m in cash - with a further €300m promised down the line.
In the 2011 programme for government, the present coalition promised to pursue a strategy to ensure the congregations paid fully half of the debt.
Ruairí Quinn is a Labour TD for Dublin South-East and former education minister.
"They just are refusing to make the contribution...they won't pay", Mr Quinn told Newstalk Breakfast.
He said as it stands, the government does not have legal powers to compel the payments - without re-opening the entire deal.
"These were hard-nosed people - they were looking at me...and saying 'how long is this guy going to be around? We can outwait them, we can outlast them".
"They don't do elections in the Catholic church," he added.
When it was put to Mr Quinn that they are in the morality business, he replied: "No they're not - they're in the propaganda business of propagating a particular set of values and a particular point of view".
Listen to his interview below.
