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Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 12 Oct 1922

Vol. 1 No. 22

THE DÁIL IN COMMITTEE. - NEW ARTICLES.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

Shall I be in order in moving the insertion of a new Article between the original Article 52 and Article 53 before we proceed with 53?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Is your amendment on the paper? Is it merely to insert an Article instead of one on the paper?

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

It is to insert an Article which will correspond to Article 55 of the Report. It is to supplement a lacuna. I am leaving out Article 54 deliberately as being unnecessary. Someone else can move it if they wish. My new Article is really Article 55 of the Committee's Report slightly modified, and it would read: "Ministers who shall not be members of the Executive Council may be nominated by the Chamber/ Dáil on the recommendation of a Committee of the Chamber/Dáil, chosen by a method to be determined by the Chamber/Dáil so as to be impartially representative of the Chamber/Dáil. Should a recommendation not be acceptable to the Chamber/Dáil the Committee may continue to recommend names until one is found acceptable."

If Deputies will look at the printed Article they will see that I am moving that Article with the substitution in the first line of the word "shall not be" instead of "are not," and the word "may" instead of "shall," and near the end of the Article I am substituting the word "may" for the word "shall."

Mr. COLE

What is before the Dáil, A Chinn Chomhairle? Are we on the original draft or are we on something else?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

We are on the original draft, and have been all the time. I wish to inform Deputy Gavan Duffy that if Article 53 of the Draft was moved he can then move to insert the new Article.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Article 53 deals with Ministers not members of the Parliament. Article 54 has been already passed. Article 55 deals with Ministers who are not members of the Dáil. Article 56 was passed, and I submit we should now go on to Article 57.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Then we leave Articles 53, 54, 55 and 56 of the Draft to be withdrawn.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

I think the only sensible thing to do in the circumstances pending the reconstruction of this matter by the Ministry is to move on to Article 57.

Professor MAGENNIS

Has Article 54 been passed?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

I take it that what the Minister means is that the substance of Article 54 is adopted in another Article?

Mr. O'HIGGINS

Yes, that is what we mean.

Professor MAGENNIS

That is a different thing. If Article 54 was passed we should have it here again on the Third Reading.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Articles 53, 54, 55 and 56 have fallen with Article 52, or have been passed in the substance of other Articles.

Mr. JOHNSON

I suggest that the Minister should ask to be allowed to withdraw Article 53, and then somebody else could move an amendment to that motion.

Mr. COLE

In view of Article 52 having been lost, and in view of the fact that Articles 53 and 55 are provisional with Article 52, does it not follow that Articles 53 and 55 fall with Article 52?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

That is precisely what the Minister has been saying. Does the Minister for Home Affairs now move Article 57?

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

When does the Minister again propose to bring those Articles before us? Personally I feel strongly that they should be brought before us. This is a matter that every opportunity should be given to consider, and to pass these clauses in an incomplete form, and then to come to the Third Reading would hardly be doing justice to the matter. I might point out there is no inconsistency between rejecting, as the Dáil has rejected, the original Article 52 which provides for certain Ministers not members of the Parliament, and accepting an amendment that I am going to ask leave to move which deals with Ministers not members of the Executive—members outside the Executive—Council.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

I revert to the suggestion I made before that Article 53 be moved formally, although it is consequentially lost, and then Deputy Gavan Duffy can move his new Article in substitution, and that can become a substantive motion.

I understood the Minister for Home Affairs moved Article 57.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

I would ask leave to move the new Article which I have read.

We accept that.

Professor MAGENNIS

The President has already denounced vigorously the doctrine involved in that, because it leaves it open to the President—not our present President, but some successor— to nominate all these Ministers.

I think you are altogether wrong.

Professor MAGENNIS

But as to those who are not members of the Executive Council, the proper doctrine is that they should be nominated by the Dáil itself. This resolution says "they may be." I prefer the mandatory position—namely, that they "shall be." If you make it "may be," you leave it open to a usurping President to say, "I am going to nominate all those outside Ministers."

I may say this much—it is not that I feel any way bad about having been beaten in these particular recommendations that we put up— but I put it that I do not think it was fair to allege against the Ministry all the things that were alleged. It was mentioned that several Civil Servants were to be engaged, and that a particular Civil Servant who is at present canvassing members of the Dáil and using his position as a Civil Servant of having been in the movement for some time to damage the position in regard to the Ministry. Now, I have got to say this much, that if that particular Civil Servant thinks he is going to get the Ministry into a position that will mean putting him into a certain office, I, as one member of the Ministry—and I think I can say the same for all the members of the Ministry—would resign rather than submit to that. This is a question in which the discipline of the service comes in. I have just been told that a particular man who was an excellent Civil Servant, but against whom certain things have been alleged because of something that happened during the last two or three years—I investigated them, and the Army had them under consideration and investigated them, and there was nothing in them—I was told that it was stated he was one of the persons we had in our mind. We had no one in our mind. The Ministry had no ulterior motive in putting up that proposition. We had no object except the one that was told to the Dáil. In this particular case we have been told all along by one Deputy that if we took out the word "shall" and put in the word "may," he would accept it. One Member here said that. Now he is accepting nothing. There are lakes that give out water and do not receive any water, and there are lakes that receive water and give out water, but this particular Deputy in question is a "lake" who receives and gives nothing. Now, as far as we are concerned, I do not understand the objection of Deputy Magennis to this. The word "may" is put in to make it permissive, and in that sense we are prepared to accept it. I do not think there is any danger of what he suggests occurring, because the Committee of the Chamber must recommend those names to the Chamber, and I think that the Chamber, either in the future as in the past, will be sufficiently strong to resist any President who seeks to usurp authority to which he is not entitled.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

May I trespass once more on the Dáil to point out that Deputy Magennis quite unconsciously was entirely misrepresenting the situation? The Dáil will observe that in the clauses we have passed up to now, there is no provision for the appointment of any Minister, whomsoever, outside the Executive Council. We have only dealt with the Executive Council Ministers. Now, this amendment suggests that the Dáil—not the President—may appoint other Ministers outside the Executive Council. But, nowhere is there any provision that the President may appoint other Ministers outside the Executive Council. The Deputy objected to my using the word "may"—those outside Ministers may be appointed by the Dáil. He draw from that the inference that what was meant was if the Dáil did not appoint them the President would appoint them. Nothing could be further from the intention that was in my mind, and nothing could be more impossible, in the actual clauses we have passed. So far we have dealt solely with people inside the Executive Council. As an addendum to that I say the Dáil if it thinks proper, by certain machinery, may appoint other people outside the Executive Council.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

Anything that would increase the liberty of the future Dáil in a matter of this kind should be accepted. It seems to me only a difference in wording. I would suggest it is a very small matter; yet it does help to clear a certain ambiguity if the first sentence read:—"Ministers not members of the Executive Council may be nominated."

Professor MAGENNIS

Deputy Gavan Duffy has, at last, made himself clear. What he wants to have put into the draft Constitution is this:—We began with a statement descriptive of one type of Minister, those that constitute the Executive Council; now he has to leave room for the addition of other Ministers who are not members of the Executive Council. I suggest that can be better done by taking it apart from the rest of the words in which he has embedded it—to allow in the Constitution the appointment of Ministers other than those comprised in the Executive Council. Then state your regulation as to how the second type Ministers are to be appointed; then there will be no ambiguity. I will read it again:—"Ministers who are not members of the Executive Council——"

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

"Shall not be."

Professor MAGENNIS

What is clear is "who are not members." My reading of the amendment is "Ministers other than members of the Executive Council."

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

The amendment moved by Deputy Gavan Duffy is:—"Members who shall not be Ministers of the Executive Council."

Professor MAGENNIS

"Members who shall not be Ministers of the Executive Council may be nominated by the Chamber." I still submit that that is open to the interpretation. "Ministers who shall not be Members of the Executive Council may be nominated by the Dáil" or otherwise. The implication is some other party can appoint them. If it is not the Dáil it is the other authority. The proper reading of it is—"There shall be Ministers, not Members of the Executive Council," or "there may be," if you like—there may be Ministers not Members of the Executive Council. Such Ministers shall be nominated by the Chamber on the recommendation of a Committee. That, I submit, is a very intelligible proposal. First, it takes power which is an enabling clause, as the lawyers say—it takes power to appoint Ministers other than Ministers constituting the Executive Council. Then it goes on to say the manner in which these are to be appointed. There is no ambiguity about that. I take it the Deputy himself would agree with that.

Mr. FITZGIBBON

The ambiguity seems to be simply this—the same as Ministers may be nominated by the Dáil and the Dáil may nominate Ministers. One is passive, the other is active. It is the same thing turned around.

Professor MAGENNIS

"Horse chestnut" turned around would read "chestnut horse." Is it suggested that that would be an equivalent? I am quite willing to accept the last phraseology, namely, "that the Dáil may appoint Ministers." That is permissive—Ministers who shall not be so-and-so may be appointed by the Dáil, undoubtedly leaves it open to the interpretation in default of someone else's appointment.

Mr. WALTER COLE

May I take it that both Deputy Magennis and Deputy Gavan Duffy are accepting wording slightly different, but with the same intention—it shall be at the option of the Chamber to nominate Ministers not members of the Executive Council.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

I should like the Dáil to pass the Clause in principle, and on the next Reading, which is more designed for that kind of thing, we can improve the wording and make it meet the views of any of the critics like the learned Professor, to whom it is not intelligible in its present form, and of others. For the present, it is to get the idea passed, and I think the words are clear enough for that.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

We will put the amendment as proposed by Deputy Gavan Duffy.

Professor MAGENNIS

Why not my amendment?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

The amendment before the Dáil is to put in before Article 57, a new Article of which he has given the text. When it becomes a substantive motion that can be done.

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

Would it be in order to propose a further amendment before we reach Article 57?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

No. We will put the amendment just carried as a substantive motion. This amendment has now become a substantive motion and we can take further amendments to it.

Professor MAGENNIS

I propose as an amendment "Ministers may be nominated who shall not be members of the Executive Council." That is the first sentence. Then, "Such Ministers shall," and the remainder as in the original.

I would like to know would the Dáil think of adjourning. We have got slightly mixed on these things and they would require some consideration. Would it be agreeable to the Dáil?

Mr. THOMAS JOHNSON

I think we should go on.

The CLERK of the DAIL

then read the amendment:—"Ministers may be nominated who shall not be members of the Executive Council. Such ministers shall be nominated by the Chamber/Dáil on the recommendation of a Committee of the Chamber/Dáil, chosen by a method to be determined by the Chamber/Dáil, so as to be impartially representative of the Chamber/Dáil. Should a recommendation not be acceptable to the Chamber/Dáil the Committee shall continue to recommend names until one is found acceptable."

The amendment was negatived.

Mr. COLE

Is it understood the wording has to be changed in accordance with Mr. Gavan Duffy's proposal?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

On the Fourth Reading amendments can be put, and on the Fifth Reading verbal amendments can be put.

The Article was agreed to, and added to the Bill.

Professor MAGENNIS

I would like to have permission to insert an Article omitted earlier, which is really missing and requires to be put in:—"If from any cause the place of a Minister becomes vacant, his successor shall be nominated and appointed in the manner herein prescribed for the nomination and appointment to such Ministry." In the possibility of an office becoming vacant, and it might be one of the type (a) or one of the type (b) we should refer to, having his successor appointed in the manner his predecessor was appointed.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

May I suggest that a clause of that kind should be drafted by the Law Adviser carefully.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

The President suggested that the Dáil should adjourn. Article 57 is now before the Dáil, and we have to dispose of that yet.

Mr. G. FITZGIBBON

I move to insert an Article before Article 57 in the Report of the Committee. The last resolution enables the Dáil to appoint Ministers who would not be members of the Executive Council. You have not provided any means by which those Ministers might be responsible for their duties, and the Article I venture to submit to you now provides how Ministers who are not members of the Executive Council are to perform their work:—"Every Minister who is not a member of the Executive Council shall be the responsible head of the Department or Departments under his charge, and shall be individually responsible to the Chamber/Dáil alone for the administration of the Department or Departments of which he is the head. Provided that, should arrangements for Functional or Vocational Councils be made by the Parliament/Oireachtas, these Ministers or any of them may, should the Parliament/Oireachtas so decide, be members of and be recommended to the Chamber/Dáil by such Councils. The term of office of any Minister not a member of the Executive Council shall be the term of the Chamber/Dáil existing at the time of his appointment, but he shall continue in office until his successor shall have been appointed, and no such Minister shall be removed from office during his term otherwise than by the Chamber/Dáil itself, and by them for stated reasons, and after the proposal to remove him has been submitted to a Committee chosen by a method to be determined by the Chamber/Dáil, so as to be impartially representative of the Chamber/Dáil, and the Committee has reported thereon." That provides that the Ministers whom you are going to appoint shall be the heads of their own Departments, and shall be individually responsible, which I think every member of the Dáil, even the members who opposed the Report of the Committee in toto, said they were anxious to have done.

Mr. W. COLE

In view of the fact that we have from Article 52/57 practically left out for the time being, and I presume that alternative proposals will be submitted in their place, would it not be rather committing us possibly to some general line of principle and policy that might be upset by these other five or six Articles that have to be submitted? I think, in view of the important provisions that there are in this particular amendment, which covers an immense amount of matters, and after hearing that we are to have new Articles submitted for those withdrawn to-day, that the President's proposal, which is that we should adjourn now until these Articles are prepared, would be a much better course than to take any Article like this at this hour. We only have half an hour to go on. I do not know whether the President has still that idea in mind or not.

Mr. THOMAS JOHNSON

I take it that the position is this, that the idea that was imported into the original motion that persons may be appointed to the Ministry who are outside the Dáil has been defeated, and that that was the paragraph and that was the idea that was obnoxious to the majority of the Dáil, but I do not think any real opposition has been offered to the idea that is embodied in this proposed amendment, and while we are on this part of the business I think we should go through with it.

Professor MAGENNIS

Perhaps Deputy Fitzgibbon would make it easier for us, and meet the wishes of Deputy Cole as well, if he would terminate this Article before the word "provided"; then we would pass that:—

"Every Minister who is not a member of the Executive Council shall be the responsible head of the Department or Departments under his charge, and shall be individually responsible to the Chamber/Dáil alone for the administration of the Department or Departments of which he is the head."

That would meet with universal acceptance. The remainder is highly controversial, and I do not think we could go through with it in the remaining half-hour, so that a compromise may be arrived at in this sense.

Mr. GERALD FITZGIBBON

I am only anxious to get through the work, and I am quite prepared to divide my proposed Article into two to stop at the point mentioned by the Deputy. We have provided for the existence of Ministers who are not members of the Executive Council; we should give them some duties before we rise to-night, and I will first move that:—"Every Minister who is not a member of the Executive Council shall be the responsible head of the Department or Departments under his charge, and shall be individually responsible to the Chamber/Dáil alone for the administration of the Department or Departments of which he is the head," leaving out all about Functional and Vocational Councils.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

I think we had better take this thing in paragraphs as was suggested, and I daresay it would meet Deputy Cole's objection, in view of the fact that we have already passed in our last amendment the principle of having other Minister besides Executive Council Ministers. Now we come to a mere matter of machinery. It is really machinery for giving effect to what is already decided.

Mr. W. COLE

I think it goes beyond that. In regard to these proposals in these first four lines, for instance, the idea of it being individual responsibility to the Dáil alone rather makes the Head of any Department—the Minister in charge of any Department—possibly independent of the Government. I would like to think out that point a little and the whole bearing of it, and the general bearing of the rest of the Government's proposals with regard to the Ministers I think we would be acting piecemeal if we went into this question, which may possibly bear on the other proposals to be submitted to us, if we take any definite stand to-night. I think, just as the original draft of the Constitution was compared one part with another, we ought to have these proposals before us before we commit ourselves to anything. We may come to a decision to-night and find to-morrow that it would throw a different light on the proposals. I appeal to the President to put the suggestion again for the adjournment until we have all the proposals.

I find it impossible to meet the views of all the members of the Chamber. Deputy Figgis, who represents, I suppose, the minority party, which has been turned into the majority, on the one hand, and the representatives from the minority party on the other hand, came to me, and I do not know what party Deputy Cole represents, so that I am afraid that on members alone it is against Deputy Cole.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

I would suggest that this Dáil has undertaken the decision that Ministers may be appointed who will not be members of the Executive Council and who will be appointed directly by the Dáil. There they are, and we have got to find a job for them, and I think we ought to complete that. That, I think, ought to be done and I agree that the Article might stop at the words "of which he is the head." And furthermore, that all the rest of that Article need never go into such an Article at all, but could be dealt with according to the Standing Orders of the Dáil, or, if you wish, the practice of the future. That should be all left open to the future.

The amendment was agreed to.

It was afterwards put as a substantive motion and passed.

Is the second part going to be amended?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

The second part is not going to be amended. What is now before us is Article 57 of the Draft as amended by the Minister for Home Affairs.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

I understood that Deputy FitzGibbon is going to move the second part separately.

I understood that too.

Mr. FITZGIBBON

Yes, but I understood the President meant that the adjournment would come before that in order to give Deputies an opportunity of considering the effect of it, but if it is the wish of the Dáil to go on, I am quite prepared to go on with the second part. I beg to move the second part of Article 57 in the Draft, that "provided that such arrangements for Functional or Vocational council be made by the Parliament/Oireachtas, these Ministers, or any of them, may, should the Parliament/Oireachtas so decide, be members of, and be recommended to, the Chamber/Dáil by such Councils. The term of office of any Minister not a member of the Executive Council shall be the term of the Chamber/Dáil existing at the time of his appointment, but he shall continue in office until his successor shall have been appointed, and no such Minister shall be removed from office during his term, otherwise than by the Chamber/Dáil itself, and by them for stated reasons, and after the proposal to remove him has been submitted to a committee chosen by a method to be determined by the Chamber/Dáil, so as to be impartially representative of the Chamber/Dáil, and the Committee has reported thereon." The reason for this provision is, that it did appear to the framers of this clause that it would be most unfair that a Minister appointed by this Dáil should be dismissed by this Dáil without some opportunity of making his own defence, and that it would be fairer to enquire into charges against him in Committee where everybody would be free to state what he thought and to discuss freely what the charges were and what the defence was than to bring up an accusation here in open Dáil, to make it perhaps a Party question, and be bandying words across the Dáil that people might afterwards be very sorry for. There is no doubt that investigation into the conduct of the Ministry could be far better done by a select impartial Committee of the Dáil who would report to the Dáil than by a general discussion upon it by 124 or 125 members in here at a time.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Has Deputy Magennis made any change in the print?

Mr. FITZGIBBON

No.

Professor MAGENNIS

I am loath to speak again on this, but I understand the Deputy is altering the wording. It seems to me—of course this is meta-physics—that here we are moving in two planes of thought moving at the same time. First of all we have a Minister who is to be, qua Minister, head of a vocational council, and the vocational council is to recommend him for appointment as Minister. That intermingling of words could be set right in the draft. I understand that to be intended, and I can agree with that. What I think it means is that previous to the appointment of a non-Executive Minister it would be possible to take the views of the vocational council assuming that it existed, in other words vocational councils would be set up and they would act as Advisory Committees on the matters in question. Among other things they would advise as to who would be the selection for a Ministry, and such Minister on being appointed by the Dáil would become ex-officio Chairman of that particular council. I think that is what is intended, but I suggest it is not quite what is stated. As regards the last part, do we avoid this bandying of charges across the Dáil by the procedure suggested here? I am in favour of an open enquiry. If a Minister is to be invited let him be invited before the Dáil that appointed him. If he cannot stand its investigation his case must be exceedingly bad. If what is to come before the Dáil for decision is the report of the Select Committee I am not so sure always that the Select Committee's report would be able to put the case fully and fairly for the decision of the Dáil. We have seen men here, ten minutes after a speech being delivered in all good faith and perfect sincerity, misrepresented by subsequent speakers. Reports are often condensed, and very often brevity is purchased at the expense of absolute accuracy and fairness, and it seems to me a bad procedure to introduce. If Ministers be indicted, they should not be tried by a Star Chamber enquiry. That is what it is; you may call it what you like. The procedure here suggested is that when enquiry is held they cry halt at the point of sentencing the prisoner, and they hand the whole case over for final adjudication to a body which has not heard the evidence or seen the witnesses. Anyone accustomed to legal affairs, especially in criminal courts, is aware that no newspaper report of the evidence, no matter how fair it is intended to be or how fully it is given, will give the effect of the testimony, the attitude of a witness and how he appears, the certain amount of reluctance, and the intonation with which he clothes the force of his evidence. All these things will weigh with the Committee, which will not be before the Dáil. I object to that in principle. Let the Minister be charged before the Dáil which appointed him, and let the Dáil dismiss him. The other plan seems a more businesslike arrangement, inasmuch as it puts into the hands of a few people this awkward business. On the other hand, there is the question of public policy, and public policy vitally concerned in dealing with the Minister. The proposal seems to be objectionable.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

I am not going into the merits or demerits of these two sentences. Supposing these two sentences do not appear in the Constitution, is there anything in the world to stop a future Dáil putting them into effect? Nothing whatever. They could do it, whether or not these sentences do or do not appear in the Constitution, and therefore these sentences are unnecessary and I urge they be not pressed.

Mr. G. FITZGIBBON

May I say one or two words in reply to what Deputy Magennis said? He talked about seeing the witnesses and judging by them. Is it conceivable that in the case of any charge made against a Minister you would produce witnesses, put them on the stand there, and have them cross-examined by every Member in order to see how they may conduct themselves under cross-examination? If charges of that kind are to be made, they will have to be made and investigated before some Committee appointed by this Dáil.

They cannot be investigated by the Dáil itself.

Mr. SEAN MILROY

It seems to me that the machinery for removing an officer or Minister is not up to date, and that nothing much short of criminal misdemeanour will warrant his removal. Now, there may be occasions when the conduct of a Department will warrant an adverse vote. I think that adverse vote, provided it is not a snatch vote but is a substantial majority, against the administration of the particular Minister should, especially as he would alone be responsible for the Department, not affect the position of the Government. It seems to me that the definite decision against this administration on the part of the Dáil should be quite sufficient to terminate his tenure of office. Judging from this, an adverse vote might be given in succession against his administration as it seems to be taken out of the power of the Dáil in its present form to remove him from his position. For that reason I am utterly dissatisfied with the general phraseology of the amendment on that particular aspect, and it creates, to my mind, an overwhelming reason for voting against it.

Professor MAGENNIS

May I point out I have not proposed that when one of these Ministers is indicted that he is to be put before the Dáil in the form suggested and that witnesses are to be examined before the Dáil. I have suggested nothing of the kind. I have pointed out the dangerous extent of any mode of trial by Committee which would report to the Dáil, and to show the dangers and limitations of such a process I took an example from criminal trials. That is not to propose that a similar type of trial should be set up here; it is to object to this procedure. Let the Minister whose administration was complained of be attacked in this Dáil, and let a vote of the Dáil decide that it disapproves of his administration. I endorse every word Deputy Milroy has said, but I object altogether to be represented as asking for a fool's performance, for a trial which, in the very nature of the case, is impossible. An argument against a thing is not a proposal or advocacy of another thing.

Mr. THOMAS JOHNSON

I submit that the procedure outlined here is exactly the procedure which Deputy Magennis would advise in a specific case, but that it does, if embodied in the Constitution, prevent an extraordinary case happening, when a Minister who may, having on some particular matter cut across the majority of the Dáil—a matter of personal unpopularity, perhaps, having hurt the feelings of a popular Member— be removed by vote of the Dáil on that incident alone without any further inquiry. The whole matter is left still with the Chamber. All that is desired is that there should be a suspension of judgment, and it ensures that action shall not be taken until the result of an inquiry by a Committee appointed by the Chamber is reported to the Chamber. I am quite certain that on any matter that one can conceive where, for instance, a charge is made against the Minister even for inability to conduct his Department properly, such a course would receive the support of Deputy Magennis, if that inquiry is to be conducted by a Committee of the Dáil to report to the Dáil. This proposition simply desires to prevent the possibility of some sudden gust of feeling removing a Minister, the head of an administrative Department, who has not had a chance, probably by virtue of the fact that he has not the eloquence to defend his case. He may be elected as a departmental official, or a Departmental Minister by virtue of his administrative faculties, and not by virtue of his abilities to persuade the Chamber of any case that he wants to put. If he cannot appeal to the gallery he may quite conceivably be removed from his office without having had a chance to defend himself, and to prevent that is all that is intended by this Clause.

Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS

I think that we should try to save something from the wreck. This objection of Deputy Milroy's simply pins us definitely back to this; that a Minister will have to proceed cautiously all the time with an eye to the Dáil, and with an eye to his prospects of carrying a particular measure. If that objection is maintained here you will force him to adopt a conservative and a reactionary kind of policy. You will put him in that way that he can never bring measures here to have them discussed on their merits, or test the tone of the Dáil. If an adverse vote is going to mean that he goes out of office, if failure to carry any particular measure means the termination of his office and the headship of his department, then you will force him back into a cautious attitude. We are trying to get away from the Party system, and we are trying to make this Parliament a deliberate Assembly as far as we can, so far as we can define the collective responsibility of five or seven members. The others should be free to bring forward measures here, and to have them discussed by all sections of the Dáil, and discussed only on their merits. I fear if you do away with this proposal of the Committee which may remove a Minister for three reasons, which are broad enough—malfeasance in office, incompetence in his headship, or failure to carry out the expressed will of Parliament—if you throw him back to the position where he will be dependent on votes, possibly snatch votes, and possibly votes gained by canvassing Army Officers, or something like that, then you are doing something that fetters him, and it will affect him in the conduct of his department, and it will force into a conservation and cautious line of policy, instead of coming here and putting his proposals to have them discussed freely on their merits.

The amendment was put and carried. It was then put as a substantive motion, and declared carried.

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