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Select Committee on Finance and General Affairs debate -
Thursday, 20 Mar 1997

SECTION 13.

I move amendment No. 53:

In page 11, subsection (1), line 22, after "Commission", to insert "seek from or".

This concerns disclosure and the prohibition of disclosure. The section forbids a member of the commission from disclosing information without the consent of the commission. My amendment also makes it an offence for somebody to put the commission or a member of the commission under pressure by seeking information on deliberations. A member of the commission should only be approached in a prescribed manner. I am not sure if my amendment addresses this issue adequately.

By and large there is consensus on what we want to achieve but this amendment does not achieve that objective. It will preclude people from asking genuine questions. We need a new section to deal with the protection of the commission from unwarranted pressure while allowing for specific and proper questions to be asked of the commission in a regulated manner. I will undertake to explicitly provide for this.

On the basis of the Minister's reply, I will not pursue the amendment. Is it the Minister's intention to come back with an amended section?

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

I move amendment No. 54:

In page 11, subsection (1), line 23, after "serving as" to insert "(or during service as)".

This amendment extends the prohibition on disclosure of information on the commission's work without the commission's consent to commission members who are no longer serving in that capacity. I do not suggest any commission member has ever disclosed confidential information. However, it is advisable to provide for a prohibition on the disclosure of confidential information. I ask the Select Committee to approve this amendment.

Amendment agreed to.
Section 13, as amended, agreed to.

Amendments Nos. 55 to 64, inclusive, are out of order. They involve a potential charge on the Exchequer.

I wish to address the ruling on these amendments.

The Deputy may not. One of the advantages of the Committee is its flexibility. If the Deputy moves amendment No. 65 he can then refer to the others.

Amendments Nos. 55 to 64 not moved.

I move amendment No. 65:

In page 11, to delete lines 30 and 31.

The new section I tried to insert would establish an independent referendum commission. It arises directly from the McKenna judgment. Given there has been so much discussion on the effect of the McKenna judgment on our electoral law, it should be incorporated into this Bill. I tried to argue the case and was overruled. The Bill contains a section where the Minister will pick up the tab for various other things included in the Bill and I was told some of my amendments need not impose a charge on the State.

An important element of the McKenna judgment is that it deals with referenda rather than elections proper. This is an appropriate Bill through which to address the issue and into which to insert this section. Since the McKenna judgment, we have had a bail referendum. We would be less than honest if we did not agree that a huge number of complaints were made regarding the lack of information about that referendum. The low turnout in that referendum was as a direct result of the lack of information provided by Government or by the ad hoc referendum commission which was set up at the time.

The amendments I proposed seek to set up an independent commission consisting of the Clerks of the Dáil and Seanad, the Ombudsman, the Comptroller and Auditor General, the President of the Law Reform Commission and two other suitably qualified people. All of the members of the commission would be public servants except perhaps the last two mentioned and all would be independent. The functions of the independent commission would be fairly broad based. If a referendum were called, the commission would carry out a range of functions such as setting a schedule for public information events and agreeing the format and content of tenders to select advertising or public relations consultants. The commission would then agree the preferred consultancy for the referendum campaign, the format and content of the documentation and the manner of presentation of information to the public. The commission would also be empowered to consult widely to ensure there would be an objective and unbiased presentation of the proposal to the public and it would engage in the appropriate research along the lines outlined in the ad hoccommission where senior counsel opinion would be sought on both sides of the argument. In addition, all aspects of advertising and public information campaigns, the appointment of consultants and so on would be included in the commission’s remit. The purpose of inserting this section would be to remove any Government input into the dissemination of information following the decision to call a referendum. That would be in keeping with the spirit of the McKenna judgment.

In the two referenda following the McKenna judgment, Governments have abided by the letter but not the spirit of the judgment. At the moment, a Government can set up an ad hoccommission and decide it will only receive £100,000 if the Government feels the argument it proposes has the greater chance of success. By starving the ad hoc commission of sufficient funds to publicise the intricacies of the proposed referendum, the Government can effectively stymie the Supreme Court decision in the McKenna judgment. Setting up a totally independent commission would allow more transparency and far greater independence in the dissemination of information and would convey the impression to the public that the spirit and the specifics of the McKenna judgment were being adhered to.

I understand the Minister is the only person who can move this type of amendment and I ask him to consider including the section I have proposed in the Bill. This is a necessary provision which should be included. If — as I hope will happen at some stage in the near future — we are discussing a new electoral system, I would like the arguments about the electoral system to be put forward by a totally independent commission which would have the wherewithal to put the case for and against electoral reform in a fair and impartial manner.

We have had discussion on how referenda should be conducted in the context of the McKenna judgment. An ad hoc commission, which I established by order, has been in place for the past two referenda. By and large the commission has worked quite well. The chairman of the Bar Council was asked to nominate two senior counsel to draw up the arguments for and against, to invite submissions in advance of drawing up those arguments and to publish them for the public in advance of a decision.

We need to look at this whole area but this Bill is already sufficiently voluminous and covers sufficient areas of electoral law not to need an entire new section to deal with this matter. It will be appropriate to amend the Referendum Act to provide for an independent referendum commission or such other mechanism as may be deemed necessary. There may not be a need for a permanent commission; the task could be assigned to some other body. However, we need some time to reflect on that and do the ground-work more effectively. That will be a job to be done later this year in the area of the ongoing reform of electoral law. In the past 12 to 18 months we have consolidated legislation on European and local elections as well as drafting this reforming act on the general election. The process is an ongoing one and we neither have the scope or the time to devise a suitable mechanism simply in the form of an amendment to this Bill. I will not deal with the issue now, nor will I put forward my own amendments on this but I listened with great interest to the views expressed by Deputy Dempsey here today and on his Private Members' Bill. We will doubtless have an opportunity before the year is out to address the issue in a substantial and stand alone way.

How stands amendment No. 65?

We have not dealt with amendment No. 65 yet which effectively proposes to delete Part III of the Bill. The section refers to payments to be made to political parties from a central fund.

We have done some work on the independent referendum commission and have drafted a solidly based Bill, which if checked by the Attorney General, would be found to be constitutional. Including it in this Bill would kill two birds with the one stone, when we have introduced the constituency commission.

We have a flock to deal with already.

Have we finished Part II of the Bill?

We are on section 14.

My amendment on the independent referendum commission was to be inserted into Part II.

This is the next consequential amendment.

We are on section 14 which is in Part III of the Bill.

The effect of my amendment is to delete all of this Part. I am confused as the amendment only states lines 30 and 31.

The Deputy wants to delete more than simply the title of Part III.

I have a problem with deleting the words "payments to political parties."

The Select Committee adjourned at 12.45 p.m.

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