There was some haste with regard to the summoning of the Selection Committee. I understand it was summoned yesterday evening by the process of handing notices to Deputies as they left the House. The meeting was held after the House adjourned. Deputy Magennis did not get a notice as he left.
That, of course, was wrong. The Selection Committee is not bound to appoint Committees impartially representative of the Dáil. The Standing Order which Deputy Johnson has quoted, and which the Minister for Lands and Agriculture has accepted, deals with the appointment of the Committee of Selection itself. New Standing Order 70 says: "...The Committee shall be otherwise constituted according to the provisions of Standing Orders Nos. 67 and 68, and so as to be impartially representative of the Dáil." An obligation, of course, rests on the Selection Committee to do its best under the circumstances. I would like to say that the utility of a Selection Committee in our procedure would be destroyed if the Selection Committee proceeded so that when there was a majority of one party the outcome of the Committee's work would be a particular result, and when there was a majority of another party there would be another result. That is not the intention, and has not been the practice. Notwithstanding the difficulty of the Minister at the moment, apparently that did not happen last night, because the Committee appears to have been unanimous. Although it is not obliged to choose a Committee in a particular way, still, the practice is that it endeavours to choose it so as to give representation to all parties. On occasions when parties are divided, as they were, for example, on a Private Members' Bill dealing with shop hours, the Committee of Selection appoints members in the way that seems best in the circumstances, but I think, always by way of unanimous report. In this instance, the Committee having been unanimous, I do not see a way out except to take the Committee that is suggested. There is this practical difficulty, that if a Government measure is referred to a Committee, and if the Government is in a majority in the House —I speak not of this Government but of Governments in general—and if the Committee does not have a majority in that particular way, it is likely to have the result that the decisions of the Committee will be reversed by the House, thus making the proceedings of the Committee, to a certain extent, a waste of time. I see no way of getting over the difficulty unless the Committee of Selection reconsiders its decision, or unless the Select Committee were increased in numbers, say, to eleven. If the Minister is not pressing the point, the matter stands. The only way I see is to increase the numbers, if it is desired to do so.