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Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 19 Oct 1922

Vol. 1 No. 24

AMENDMENTS TO ARTICLE 50.

Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS

The sixth amendment is to Article 50. It proposes —"To delete from the word `but,' on line 48, to the word `amendment' on line 54, both inclusive, and to insert in lieu the following:—`But no such amendment, passed by both Houses of the Oireachtas, after the expiration of a period of eight years from the date of the coming into operation of this Constitution, shall become law, unless the same shall, after it has been passed or deemed to have been passed by the said two Houses of the Oireachtas, have been submitted to a referendum of the people, and unless a majority of the voters on the Register shall have recorded their votes on such referendum, and either the votes of a majority of the voters on the Register, or two-thirds of the votes recorded, shall have been cast in favour of such amendment.' " This simply makes the thing somewhat clearer, and provides for an eight years' period instead of five years. Also, there is a change there—a change from 5 to 8 in line 55. I think that, beyond that change in the time, there is no change of substance; it is merely a matter of the wording, as the new amendment is clearer.

Mr. T. JOHNSON

As this amendment fulfils a request or plea that I made on behalf of those who act with me, I beg to second it, and to withdraw my motion No. 5.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

I think the amendment is an excellent one, and carries out what I had attempted to do in amendment No. 8 in a rather different form of wording, and I withdraw that amendment.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Amendments 7 and 8 are withdrawn, and we take the amendments 6 and 9 as proposed by the Minister for Home Affairs and seconded by Deputy Johnson as agreed.

Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS

I move Amendment 10—to delete "Section III. —The Executive"—and to delete the sub-heading "An Executive Council/ Aireacht."

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. KEVIN O'HIGGINS

We come now to the Executive Proposals, and the Government's attitude in this matter is to preserve, or to attempt to preserve, the reduction of collective responsibility to the minimum of Ministers, and to leave a certain number of Ministers individually responsible for the conduct of their own departments. We therefore suggest that a change in Article 51—"The Executive Council shall consist of not more than 12 nor less than 5 Ministers." That would leave the President free to make his entire Ministry of the Executive Council or to leave 2 or 3 or more Ministers to be filled by the Committee of the Dáil, and limiting his own Executive Council to the collective responsibility of a number, perhaps 7 or 8 Ministers, but it leaves him the discretion whether he will do that or not. It is permissive rather than mandatory, so that it leaves a latitude and discretion to the President. He may choose to appoint only 6 or 7 Ministers and make these Executive Council, and leave the filling of the remaining Ministers to the Committee to the Dáil, or he may appoint all the Ministers, in which case all the Ministers will form the Executive Council.

Mr. JOHNSON

I think the suggestion that the option should be given to the President for the time being to say that he shall have an Executive of 12 is not wise. I think the sense of the House was that there should be a number of Ministers responsible for what you might call Technical Departments, rather than departments affected by public policy, or directing public policy, that should be directly responsible to the House. If you leave that decision to the option of the President, it is asking us to do what the present President said was too great a responsibility to be put on any individual Minister. The amendment of the Minister for Home Affairs leaves the option of seven Ministers to the President. The Council cannot be more than 12, and it must not be less than 5, and the option is left the President to decide whether the number shall be the larger or the smaller. I think that that is against the wish of the House, as expressed on the last occasion, and I would urge the substitution of the word "seven" for "twelve," so as to read that, "the Executive shall consist of not more than seven, nor less than five." I think all the arguments that were used from Ministerial benches at the last discussion tend to favour the reduction of the number of what you might call the Cabinet, the body responsible for the general policy, so that there could be a real collective mind in regard to this question of general policy. But we are asked now to leave that option to the President for the time being, and I suggest that that is contradicting the will of the Dáil in the matter, and I would press the proposition that it should be limited to seven; that is to say, that the Executive Council should consist of not more than seven nor less than five.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

I sincerely hope that the Ministry will see their way to accept Deputy Johnson's amendment, because if they reflect upon the suggestion they have made they will see that it would surely destroy the whole spirit of the new scheme that is being adopted. I should like to remind the Ministers that the Special Committee that was appointed by the President, consisting of supporters of this new scheme, unanimously recommended that there should be not more than seven people in the Inner Cabinet. Now, it seems to me it is rather a strong thing for the Cabinet to go against the unanimous recommedation of the Committee unless they can produce some overwhelming reason for doing so, and I believe if you pass the Ministerial amendment you will leave the President in a somewhat unfortunate position. Any man who is elected President—and Ministers know this better than other Teachtaí—will be assailed on all sides, directly and indirectly, by people who think themselves admirably fitted for such and such a job. The unfortunate President will be the target for all these gentlemen, who will be tumbling over one another to get into certain places. The proposal, as put by Deputy Johnson, for the Executive Council relieves the President of the odium of having to say to a good many of his friends that he could do nothing for them. It puts the matter in the hands of the Dáil, and not the President, and I do urge the Minister for Home Affairs to accept the amendment by Deputy Johnson, which represents the spirit and the intention of the Committee appointed to go into this matter.

Mr. ERNEST BLYTHE

I might say one thing about this matter, following on Deputy Gavan Duffy's statement that the President would be assailed, and that the Ministers knew better than the other Members of the Dáil that he would be assailed by people who were seeking office. It is, perhaps, not necessary to say to the Members of the Dáil that the Ministers do not know anything of the sort, and there certainly has not been any assailing of the President in the past by people who were seeking office. The object of this amendment proposed by the Minister for Home Affairs is to, secure elasticity. The Committee recommended a proportion of not more than seven or less than five of the Ministers being members of the Executive Council, but of course the scheme that was put forward by the Committee was not adopted by the Dáil. One of the ideas that was in mind when it was suggested that outside Ministers should be brought in was to get men who would not be affiliated with any political party, and it was with the idea that there might be men on the Ministry who would not be returned as politicians or members of any political party that it was thought it would be possible to have the overwhelming body of the Ministry individually responsible. Now all the Ministers must be Members of the Dáil. All of them must consequently be men who get in on some sort of political basis. It may be that we may find it possible in the future, and even in the immediate future, to have the majority of the Members of the Ministry Ministers who are individually responsible, but the desire is to get elasticity. This change, in which we have not a Ministry of which all the members are individually responsible, and not a Ministry which is collectively responsible only, is in the nature of an experiment, and we thought there would be a better chance of its getting a fair trial and of its being a success if there was as much elasticity as possible provided for—if just so many Members were individually responsible in the first instance as was found suitable in the peculiar circumstances of the case. There is also another thing in favour of this—the degree of elasticity that is provided for in the amendment. We are not yet arrived at normal times. In a time of crisis it might well be desirable to have the entire Ministry, or practically the entire Ministry, collectively responsible. In normal times I would see no need at all for that but as we are just passing out of abnormal times into normal times, there is a further advantage in allowing the President and those who would work with him the choice of having the whole body of Ministers, or practically the whole body of Ministers, collectively responsible if they think fit. In regard to the suggestion that the President would have the option of appointing all the Ministers members of the Executive Council, that will depend a good deal upon the temper of the House. The President will have to be proposed and nominated by the Dáil. If there is a desire expressed, he, perhaps, will explain his attitude in regard to this matter. I think it leaves it open. In any case, at the present stage an amendment such as has been proposed by Deputy Johnson, making the number seven or less than five, gives too little scope for variation with the circumstances, and is too rigid in view of the experimental nature of this division.

Mr. DARRELL FIGGIS

Briefly the reasons that the Minister for Local Government has stated—reasons covered by the word "elasticity"—are the same as urge me to prefer the number twelve to the number seven. There is one further reason that has not been mentioned, and it is this: Deputy Johnson, when speaking of the Executive Council, referred to its collective responsibility for the policy of the country, whereas these other Ministers, whom I irreverently called yesterday cab-tout Ministers, would be directly responsible to the Dáil each for his own Department. But there is one further responsibility that has not been mentioned, and that should be mentioned. It is that the Ministers forming the Executive Council share a collective and exclusive responsibility in respect of finance—a responsibility, that is to say, that is not shared by those who do not form part of the Executive Council. Surely the more Ministers who share that financial responsibility the better for the unified administration of finance, as well as for proposals brought forward to the Dáil recommending the expenditure of money. We have already stated in this Constitution that the Executive Council, and only the Executive Council, has financial responsibility. It follows that any Minister not a member of the Executive Council is dependent on the will of that Council in respect of matters of finance.

Mr. GERALD FITZGIBBON

There is one observation that I would like to put before the Dáil when they come to consider this matter. I do not know myself yet whether I am going to vote for the amendment proposed by Deputy Johnson or not, but I wish to press a consideration on the Ministers which may induce them to accept Deputy Johnson's amendment instead of their own proposal. I am not at all desirous of pressing on the Dáil or Ministers the unanimous opinion of any Committee. Committees are no better than anyone else, and I do not think the fact that ten people happen to arrive at agreement in a back room is any reason why their collective wisdom should be greater than any other members of this Dáil. But one of the matters that weighed most strongly with this Committee in making this recommendation of not less than five or more than seven was this—the Dáil has accepted the principle that there may be Ministers who are not on the Executive Council; therefore, if you have an Executive Council of twelve, you may have an unlimited number of other Ministers who are not on the Executive Council. Under the original draft you could not have more than twelve Ministers whoever they were. In the Constitution in its present form you may have up to twelve on the Executive Council. You may have other Ministers who are not members of the Executive Council nominated by the Chamber. One of the great objects, I think, that we should aim at in our early days is to avoid expense as far as possible, by not overcrowding the Dáil with Ministries of one shape or another. Now, the Committee came to the conclusion, rightly or wrongly, that a thoroughly good—I will call it Cabinet for the moment—a Cabinet of five, six or seven, could carry on the main policy of the country. That left a margin of other Ministers from outside who would run their own departments, and it is surely undesirable that we should have an excessive number of Ministers—twelve good Ministers and subordinate Ministers as well, in a House so small as this, and to run a country which, however you look at it, has only four million of people, and some forty thousand square miles in area. Is it necessary to have more than twelve Ministers; is it desirable to have more than twelve Ministers? Surely, twelve is an ample staff to conduct the business of this country. Now, the Minister of Local Government said that we were still in abnormal times. I should have thought myself that abnormal times were the very times in which you want to concentrate the main work of the country into as few hands as possible. In the most abnormal times of all the Roman Empire, and other Empires, too, found it necessary to appoint a dictator, because they thought it was better that the whole running of the country should be committed to one or two men, who might have sole responsibility and full control. I should have thought that in abnormal times you would seek most of all to concentrate responsibility and control in a few hands, and leave those Ministers who have Departments that are not really concerned with the vital details of the country, to conduct them without having to share responsibility with four or five heads of the Government who are looking after the major affairs. If the Ministry say they consider it vital that they should have this elasticity of the twelve, I am not prepared myself to vote against that, but I would urge upon them to reconsider it in view of what they have heard, and see if Deputy Johnson's amendment would not meet the case.

Mr. K. O'HIGGINS

Deputies are aware that with reference to the Executive proposals we invited the Dáil to get clear away from the cut and thrust of Party politics; that we sketched the kind of assembly we would have here in future, having regard to the system of franchise that we have—the system of Proportional Representation—that we would have here not a Dáil composed of two or three large and solid parties, but rather a Dáil composed of a great many groups, and groups that would not be stereotyped, that would not vote on all matters, but would vote together perhaps to-day and differently to-morrow, according as their opinions or their interest changed. We felt that in such a Dáil, with a strict Party system in play, you would not have stability; you would have very frequent changes of Government, and you would have consequently very little continuity of policy in the Departments of State. And so, in the Executive proposals which we put before the Dáil, we asked for practically a root and branch abolition of the Party system. We asked that a very small Executive Council would take collective responsibility for the broad matters of policy, and that outside that Council each Minister would be individually responsible to the Dáil and would stand or fall on the running of his own particular Department and the soundness of the measures which he brought before the Dáil. It was not exactly that he would go out of office if any particular measure that he brought before the Dáil was defeated, because that would force him back to a very cautious, conservative kind of policy in the running of his Department, but that he should be judged by the Dáil broadly on the conduct of his Department, and would be removable only on the head of malfeasance in office, incompetence in the conduct of his Department, or failure to carry out the expressed will of the Dáil. To emphasise the non-party nature of the administration, and aiming only at giving the people the greatest efficiency in their services, we asked that this Selection Committee of the Dáil would be entitled to go outside the strict membership of the Dáil itself to select Ministers from all people eligible for election to this Dáil. If they saw outside a man whom they considered eminently fitted for the headship of a particular Department, the fact of his non-membership of the Dáil would not be an insuperable obstacle. We considered that government should be in he interests of the people, and that State services should be run with an eye to the maximum of efficiency for the people. So we brought these proposals before the Dáil, and this Dáil, with certain emphasis, rejected them.

Mr. T. JOHNSON

One vote.

Mr. K. O'HIGGINS

Yes; one vote. But there was a certain emphasis even about that one vote. We are sorry that these proposals were rejected. We believed, and we still believe, that their adoption would have been to the best advantage of the country and the citizens of the country, and now we are forced into the position that we are trying to save from the wreck whatever was good in those proposals and whatever is left. What is left really is that we can still have an Executive Council taking collective responsibility for the broad matters of policy, and that we can still have in dividual responsibility of certain Ministers. The Dáil did not approve of the principle that Ministers might be elected from citizens eligible for election to the Dáil, but who need not necessarily be Members of the Dáil. Now, as between this seven and five, that is a very open matter. Deputy Johnson thinks that the Executive should be limited to seven, not more than seven, and not less than five, whereas our proposal leaves it free to the President to make the entire Ministry his Executive Council, or, alternatively, to have the Executive Council as small as five. It was simply the view that in changing circumstances and changing material behind him in his party, and even in the Dáil itself, that it was unfair to bind the hands of future Presidents, and that it might be claimed that the best thing to do was to leave them a certain discretion. He, after all would be the person primarily responsible for the running of the Government. And in any one particular Parliament it might be clear to him that he had behind him men of sufficiently good calibre to appoint, who could take collective responsibility with him for all matters, and in another Parliament he might feel that only five or six of his particular party were of "Ministerial timbre," if I might use the expression, and he would prefer to leave to a Committee of the Dáil broadly to select the others from any other party of the Dáil. We have no decided preference. If the Dáil prefers Deputy Johnson's figure of not less than five and not more than seven, that will be quite agreeable to us. We feel that our own motion was put down rather with the view to try and suit ourselves to the temper and opinion of the Dáil. We had no particular preference for that figure, and we thought that if the Dáil had not a feeling in favour of those proposals, then the best we could hope for was that they would not absolutely bar their being put into operation in the future, and that they would leave the President a latitude in the matter. Personally, I would be glad to see Deputy Johnson's amendment carried, and it is a very open matter for the Dáil.

The amendment was put and declared carried. A division was called for.

Professor THRIFT

Did we not agree on that point?

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Yes, we agreed on that, but a division was called for by Deputy Gavan Duffy.

Mr. GAVAN DUFFY

There was a misapprehension.

On a division the amendment was carried by 32 votes to 13, the voting being as follows:—

Tá.

Níl.

Seán Ó Lidheadha.Micheál Ó hAonghusa.Seán Mac Haol.Liam de Róiste.Séamus Breathnach.Peadar Mac a' Bháird.Darghal Figes.Seán Ó Ruanaidh.Ailfrid Ó Broin.Seosamh Mag Craith.Éarnan Altún.Sir Séamus Craig.Gearóid Mac Giobúin.Liam Thrift.Liam Mag Aonghusa.Pádraic Ó Máille.Seosamh Ó Faoileacháin.Seoirse Mac Niocaill.Seamus Ó Cruadhlaoich.Criostóir Ó Broin.Tomás Mac Artúir.Séamus Ó Dóláin.Aindriú Ó Laimhín.Proinsias Mag Aonghusa.Eamon Ó Dúgáin.Peadar Ó hAodha.Séamus Ó Murchadha.Seosamh Mac Giolla Bhríghde.Alasdair Mac Cába.Tomás Ó Domhnaill.Éarnan de Blaghd.Uinseann de Faoite.

Pádraig Ó Gamhna.Tomás de Nógla.Riobárd Ó Deaghaidh.Tomás Mac Eóin.Seoirse Ghabhain Uí Dhubhthaigh.Liam Ó Briain.Tomás Ó Conaill.Aodh Ó Cúlacháin.Séamus Éabhróid.Liam Ó Daimhín.Seán Ó Laidhin.Nioclás Ó Faoláin.Domhnall Ó Ceallacháin.

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