I move Article 52 as it stands in the draft of the Bill.
THE DÁIL IN COMMITTEE. - NEW ARTICLE.
Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS
Mr. FITZGIBBON
I move as an amendment, to substitute before Article 52 a new Article defining the duties of the Executive Council, and prescribing that they shall be collectively responsible for their own Departments, and prescribing that they shall prepare estimates of receipts and expenditure for each financial year to be presented to the Chamber before the close of the previous financial year. That is, in fact, taken from another portion of the Constitution.
Professor MAGENNIS
I would like to move as an amendment to that, that the words "the Executive Council shall meet and act as a collective authority, provided, however, that any Minister of the Executive Council who is Head of a separate Department of State shall be individually responsible to An Dáil for the administration thereof and shall retire from office on a specific vote of disapproval of his administration being passed by An Dáil." The idea behind this amendment is to differentiate between members of the Executive Council who have portfolios and the members of the Executive Council, like the President and Vice-President, who have not —I may be wrong in my assumption that the Executive Council might include a number of Ministers, probably not merely three—perhaps that is a misreading on my part; but, suppose at any time there were the case of a Minister for Finance, who is one such as I describe, he ought to be individually responsible, on certain occasions at least. I referred to this earlier in the other debate. The object of my amendment is to obviate the difficulties that would arise from cross voting. I want the Ministry to be turned out only on a specific vote directed to that end. To preclude the possibility of the Ministry being overturned in an irregular way, I wish to make a member of an Executive Council who is in charge of a Department individually responsible for his own work. I put this forward for consideration now:
"to add to Article 51 (a), `provided, however, that any Minister of the Executive Council who is Head of a separate Department of State shall be individually responsible for the administration thereof, and shall retire from office on a specific vote of condemnation of his administration being passed by the Dáil.' ”
AN CEANN COMHAIRLE
Having given notice of that amendment, we will dispose of the first amendment first and if it becomes a substantive motion, dispose of that.
Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS
Where does my amendment come in here?:—
"The Executive Council shall be directly responsible to, and removable by the Chamber/Dáil, but shall continue to carry on their duties until their successors are appointed. The Chamber/Dáil may, by a vote of lack of confidence, remove the entire Executive Council, or any individual Minister/Aire. Provided that the Chamber/Dáil may not be dissolved on the advice of the President after he shall have lost the confidence of the Chamber/Dáil."
AN CEANN COMHAIRLE
Part of it has already been passed.
Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS
Only the first and second sentences of it.
AN CEANN COMHAIRLE
We can take the amendment by Deputy FitzGibbon, which was proposed first. Having disposed of it, we can take Deputy Magennis's amendment, and then yours.
Mr. G. FITZGIBBON
Deputy Magennis's amendment is only an addition to the clause. Until that clause is adopted, that addition will scarcely come in.
AN CEANN COMHAIRLE
That is exactly the point.
The amendment by Deputy FitzGibbon was put and carried. It was then put as a substantive motion and passed.
Professor Magennis's amendment was then read.
Mr. GAVAN DUFFY
I, for one, am entirely opposed to this amendment. If we are to have a Party system at all— and we are retaining it, inasmuch as we have already provided for it in the earlier part of this clause—you cannot consistently provide at the same time that your Ministers who are heads of the Party shall not stand or fall together. So far as the first part of Deputy Magennis's amendment goes, it is already provided for. Whether or not you say Ministers shall be individually responsible to the Dáil, it stands to reason that they will be individually responsible. Every Minister of the Executive Council will be individually responsible to the Dáil, and the object of the Deputy's amendment is to go further and provide that you can get rid of one particular Member of the Council while still retaining the others. That is objectionable, because the strength of the Inner Cabinet or the Executive Council is the fact that it stands or falls together—that in all matters of big policy, fiscal, foreign affairs, defence, and so forth, that a small group of men meet together to decide and define the line of policy, and, having so decided, is prepared to stand or fall together. It is a source of confidence to the Dáil, and the supporters of any particular Government, to know that there is a body at the head of affairs not consisting of one or two men, but several chosen leaders, who are standing together on general matters of policy, and the fact that we are going to decide that certain other non-political offices shall not be the subject of collective responsibility, is no argument whatever so long as the Party system is retained to remove the collective responsibility in the fullest sense from the men who are inside the Cabinet. The first part of the Deputy's amendment provides what is the effect in any case and unnecessary, namely, that every man of the Inner Council will be individually responsible and can be called to book by the Dáil, and the second part contradicts the essential principles of the Party system, which we are retaining to this extent, that if one of the men of the Inner Cabinet is defeated, then his colleagues must fall with him. The whole strength of that Executive Council will lie in the fact that they are united. If the principle were advocated we should have to adopt the Swiss system in its entirety, so that every Minister will be individually responsible, and there will be no collective responsibility whatever. Abandon the Party principle if you like. I am dead against the proposal, which is a contradiction in terms, as it seems to me the Deputy's amendment is.
Professor MAGENNIS
I am much indebted for the support Deputy Duffy has given to my amendment, for he has made it clear that the amendment is aimed at the destruction of the Party system. We have been pressed here frequently since we began our deliberations in favour of the rejection of the Party system. We were told it is British, and therefore bad. Now when an effort is made to get rid of so much of the Party system as is involved in the draft proposals, the argument is made against it that it does injuriously affect the Party system.
Mr. K. O'HIGGINS
We do not accept or approve of Deputy Magennis's amendment. We spoke here of reducing the evils of the Party system to a minimum and of confining the collective responsibility of a small group around the President. We never contemplated that one man of the group could be picked out and assailed and that the others would not go down with him. That would be an utterly impossible position of things. That group must be a group representing broad lines of policy, and it must stand together. Outside it there could be Ministers, and we say there should be Ministers, whose sole responsibility to the Dáil is responsibility for the efficient running of their own Departments and the soundness of the measures they bring before the Dáil for approval. But to encroach upon that Inner Executive Council and say any one of these individuals can be——
Professor MAGENNIS
I for one only referred to those who are Heads of Departments.
Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS
And that a particular political group cannot be broken up in that way and they must stand as one man over their policy and over the measures they bring before the Dáil. To suggest, for instance, that you could pick out the Finance Minister, and pass your vote of censure on him, or your Defence Minister, if he was a member of the Executive Council, without bringing down the President and his Administration, is simply unsound. That group will be a group standing for the main policy. You cannot break it up into individual departments, and in any case it is one political entity. It is a body standing for the big matters, standing for, say, the external policy of the country, and it would be an impossible position to place the President in, to say that you could pick out one of these men of his, whom he selected for his inner group, pass your vote of censure, or your vote of no confidence in him, and leave the President the poorer by the loss of one strong personality in his inner Cabinet. Deputy Magennis, I think, rather put in this amendment on the spur of the moment, and his suggestion that Deputy Gavan Duffy's criticism of him was unsound because of anything that passed here or anything that was said from these benches, contains a fallacy. We never suggested that the Executive Council or any member of the Executive Council should have individual responsibility for his department.
Professor MAGENNIS
I understood from the Minister himself that he had described future Dála as made up, not so much of parties as of groups, and he sketched out the dangers that were incidental to the group system. He recommended certain things as palliative of the evils attendant on the group system. And now I say that he changes his position, and he advocates as regards the Executive Council the Party system. I do not mean the case of the President, the Vice-President and certain Members. For example, there might be—and Deputy Gavan Duffy reminds me of it—a nominal Minister for Foreign Affairs, whose duties would be discharged by a Committee of Ministers. It is quite possible to have that collective discharge of certain administrative duties, but when you come to the Head of a Department, it is surely not contemplated that the entire Cabinet has to work the Department. If so, I can easily prophesy confusion. There is no Department of State as a domestic concern based on domestic administration, that could be worked by a joint council in that way. Imagine the Minister for Finance, for example, having the work of his Department done by several men at once. I need not repeat what I have said. It is so obvious that any Minister in the Executive Council, who is the Head of a Department, is for all purposes of the administration of that Department, exactly on all fours with these Ministers who are to be selected from outside the Dáil. There should be a certain group, a nucleus of the Government, or rather of the Executive, and the members of that should be interdependent, and have a joint responsibility, that is absolutely necessary. The Executive Government cannot be carried on without it. These men will represent the group dominant in the House. It is represented that we shall have the Group System plus the Party System; that is altogether inconceivable, and I think that instead of accusing me of proposing a thing on the spur of the moment, that it would be much better for the Minister to confess that his criticism was made on the spur of the moment.
MINISTER for AGRICULTURE (Mr. P. Hogan)
I should like very much to take whatever time is necessary, to know exactly where we are in this matter.
Professor MAGENNIS
If you came to the Dáil, you would know.
Mr. HOGAN
I was long enough in the Dáil, if it was only made clear by the Deputy when he introduced the Amendment; that is, if his own mind was quite clear when he was proposing it. This Amendment is an amendment to Article 53. It provides that any Minister of the Executive Council, who is Head of a separate Department of State, shall be individually responsible for the administration thereof, and shall retire from office on a specific vote of condemnation of his administration being passed by the Dáil. Well, now, on a reading of that, it seems to mean in effect any member of the Executive Council, that is to say any Minister, good, bad, or indifferent——
Professor MAGENNIS
Who is head of a Department.
Mr. HOGAN
Who is head of a Department. Presumably all, or practically all, Ministers would be heads of departments. It seems to mean that any such Minister may be turned down, or his policy, by the Dáil, the policy which he has considered collectively at Cabinet Meetings, with the rest of the Cabinet, and that at the same time the Cabinet shall not resign and that notwithstanding that there shall be collective responsibility.
Professor MAGENNIS
For collectively done work.
Mr. HOGAN
I am not a metaphysician, but I fail to understand that, and I wish to know how many Members of the Dáil understand that, with the exception of Professor Magennis. I suggest, with great respect to Professor Magennis, that that in word and in effect is a contradiction in terms. Now, we did attempt to get away from the Party System. We did attempt to make an experiment here, to give a chance to this country to evolve something new, and we tried to do that with the least possible risks to a new State, but that particular experiment was attacked from every possible point of view, by every possible species of special pleading and by arguments that every sensible man in the Dáil knows had absolutely nothing to do with the case, and it was beaten in the Dáil. We were careful in our attempts to formulate something new, to preserve the doctrine of collective responsibility, because we know, and it is the experience of every State, that the doctrine of collective responsibility is absolutely necessary for an efficient Government, and we were careful to preserve it, but we did not see that it was absolutely necessary, while preserving the doctrine of collective responsibility, to break out in other directions and to give a chance to other ideas to grow. That was the idea that was in our heads when we were preparing our particular Executive. That was what we were driving at; that was what we were trying to get at. We were trying to give a chance to whatever Dáil would be elected in the future, when they found it expedient. We were trying to give them an opportunity to break out into new directions; we were not allowed to do so. We want to have this quite clear. We were careful to preserve in our scheme this doctrine of collective responsibility, and because the particular experiment which we tried to make has been turned down by the Dáil. I want the Dáil to be careful this doctrine of collective responsibility is still preserved. That is quite a simple position and no amount of special pleading will alter it. That amendment is an absolute contradiction in terms when put side by side with Article 52, and I ask the Dáil to reject it.
Professor WILLIAM MAGENNIS
I desire, on a personal point that has arisen, to make one observation. Yesterday evening and this evening I attacked the Minister for Agriculture for his infrequent visits to the Dáil. I was in utter ignorance of the fact that his health had broken down, and that that was the reason why he had been unable to attend. I think it right that I should apologise for making an accusation arising out of my own genuine ignorance of the state of affairs. Had I known that was so, I certainly should have refrained from making any remark of the kind, and I take this, the earliest opportunity I have had on being informed of his illness, to make that explanation to the Dáil.
Mr. THOMAS JOHNSON
I would like to suggest, in regard to the Amendment, that, while it is perfectly logical as a result of the arguments that have been used in favour of individual responsibility, that the Heads of Departments, apart from those who are outside the Executive, if there are to be such, should be individually responsible to the Dáil for the working of these Departments it is only practicable, if we were to conceive of a number of Ministers sufficiently large to direct policy on the larger issues, and none of whom were Heads of Departments. I submit, and I think the Deputy who moved the Amendment will agree, that it is a practical proposition, that if we are trying to reduce, or keep within moderate limits the number of Ministries you will need to give to certain members of the Executive Council, Departmental Headship. The Finance Department may be one, but it is obvious to everybody that the Finance Minister will have to be a Member of that Executive which is responsible for general policy. And so with certain other Ministries; and I imagine in practice we shall find that the number of Ministers without portfolio will be reduced to one. That practical difficulty would prevent me voting for the Amendment. There is need for having, in virtue of the numerical strength of the Ministry, these separate Ministers responsible for general policy to be also responsible heads of Departments. If we take these more important Departments and consider them as outside purely Departmental offices in the narrowest sense, I think it will be recognised there is need for having collective responsibility over those larger offices within the inner executive. Consequently, while I recognise the logic of the plea put forward by the Deputy who moved the Amendment, I think in practice it is inadmissible.
Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS
I wish to say in regard to the proposal of Deputy Magennis, although I am not quite sure of the exact wording, I think the principle is sound. Deputy Johnson has stated that if we could consider these Ministers outside themselves as Administrative Heads of Departments, we would have to consider them as being responsible for a certain general policy. But what I would suggest is, that they are both things at one and the same time; they are both responsible for general policy and for the effective and efficient administration of that policy. Take the case mentioned by the Minister for Home Affairs. He referred to the Minister for Defence. I chose that. I come across that, and I do not take it with any reference to present-day affairs. A policy might be adopted in respect of the Department for which the Minister for Defence is responsible. A policy might be proposed for the Minister for Defence and might be accepted by the Executive Council, and might be confirmed by the Dáil, and the Dail might be perfectly convinced that is the right policy for the Executive Council to adopt. It might also be convinced that the right man is not in charge of the execution of that Department, and that there should be some more efficient man, and that there has been some part of his executive work that has not been capably done. In the case of a specific issue of that kind, in respect of definite administrative work, it is surely within the right of the Dáil, or any legislature, to remove one Minister without the necessity of impugning the whole Executive Council. That difference is constantly occurring. I believe that if there were an attempt made by a future Dáil to attack a particular Minister because of his policy, then the right action would be that his colleagues should stand up for him and say: "We will all resign if you compel him to resign." Then the Dáil would have its choice if it wished to press this authority, and so remove the whole Ministry. I suggest that the liberty of the Dáil should equally be protected. On the other hand, while not expressing any criticism on the policy of the Ministry, it should be at liberty to get rid of any particular Minister.
Mr. P. HOGAN
I appreciate what Professor Magennis said about me, and I may say that I had taken it for granted before he stated it.
Mr. G. FITZGIBBON
The remarks of Deputy Figgis answer his own case The very reason why you shall not be able to remove a member of the Executive Council by an adverse vote is that the Executive Council have not been appointed by the Dáil, but selected by the President, and his own immediate officers concerned with the policy of which he is the head, and you cannot take one from him and impose another upon him without bringing him down, because you have shown a want of confidence in him and his ability to select a proper man to carry on the duty. Again, the position of the Executive Council is not to be managing the Department of Finance or the Department of Defence, but the Department of Defence and the Department of Finance are so completely interlocked with one another and with the rest of those offices managed by the Executive Council that they must be considered as an Executive Council as a whole. They must all be worked from the point of view of common policy. You cannot have the Minister for Defence, who wants money for the Army, and the Minister for Finance, who will not give him the money, working apart. The Minister for Foreign Affairs who wants to take on the foreign policy, will want both an Army and a Navy. All those three offices must work together, and the actual work of any one of them must bring down the others if they do not support it, and if the Dáil does not support them.
Some years ago I read of a Whip of the Conservative Party in England who was described as "having been long since gathered to his Fathers," and during his office as a Whip he used very bad language to members who wished to escape from attendance of the House. His language was described as vile, blasphemous and sulphurous. I could imagine that man being elected to the Ministry here, and those Members who like polite language, or who are of a religious turn of mind, objecting to him. There are some religious members in this Dáil who, I believe, would take a strong stand on that point. Those who would regard such language as being offensive would vote against him, and his real administrative capacity would not be taken into account at all. It would be a pity to lose that man because "his tongue ran away with him." I do not think it would be well if that occurred.
The amendment was put and negatived.
Motion made and question put: "That Article 51A be added to the Bill."
Agreed.