I understand that the Taoiseach in opening the debate quoted from a resolution which hung on what the English people call the Great Revolution of 1688 with, I think, something from 1690, and the Bill of Rights. It is a long time ago, over 250 years, and it took a long time to get the decision which the British did get in the Declaration of the Bill of Rights, that there should be freedom of debate in Parliament, that Parliamentary proceedings should not be capable of being impeached in court, but that the House itself should take charge. For 250 years we have been told to keep and to hold fast to the same privilege. Now it is proposed to break in on that privilege for the very insufficient reasons presented to the House by the couple of people who dared to speak after the Taoiseach, and endeavoured to support him. It took a long time to get to the 1690 decisions. It has been there since, because it is recognised as the foundation and privilege of Parliament, as in the public interest, not given as a special privilege attaching to members of Parliament as such, so that they could get personal kudos and personal emoluments, but because it was always thought right in the public interest that men should be allowed to speak their minds freely in an Assembly like this, and should not be under terror of legal action in court by privileged or moneyed people whom they might think it their duty to attack. That privilege was left notwithstanding that on occasions there were abuses.
After all, people came to the conclusion that it was right and of paramount public interest that serious charges of a public nature should be ventilated in public and reproductions of Parliamentary debate or any other form of expression should not be subject to criminal proceedings or to proceedings for defarmation of libel. That is the foundation upon which we were raised, and it is the foundation which the Taoiseach now tries to disturb and overthrow. People have been talking of periods in this House. I have been here for many years. I have listened to some gross abuse of Parliamentary privilege, mainly by people now in the Government. I was here on an occasion when a person who was Vice-president of the Party, and later Vice-President of the State, told us, in connection with a desperate assassination, that we know who the people were who were guilty of that murder and would not prosecute them. We sent a detective-officer to his house next day and he crawled. He had no evidence to support the wide statement he had made. At a time when public opinion was agitated over what was called the economic war the Taoiseach thought fit to assert against Deputy Mulcahy that he was in collusion with the Minister for Defence in England.
He crawled the next day, but the lie had been given a start. On another occasion when that particular assassination came under review here, a man who is now a member of the Government asked us did we expect that people would tell, that they would assist the police, that they would be informers? It was a fairly gross abuse of privilege to speak in that way about that particular matter, but in the end it was better the privilege should last, even though there were these gross abuses, because, to everybody's knowledge, the people who uttered these foul defamations suffered more in the public estimation than the people against whom they were directed. The privilege went on and has withstood even that sort of complete, entire and deliberate abuse.
I should like to draw the attention of the House to another side of this matter. There have been very useful helps given to the state from the fact that people could say here what they liked, without fear of being crushed to the ground by heavy actions brought against them in the courts. I took the responsibility in this House of exposing what afterwards became known as the Wicklow gold matter. Does anybody say that was not a good use of a Parliamentary privilege? Does anybody deny that, with the information I had, I could have exposed myself to the risk of actions in the courts by the people who were about to feather their nests if that particular scandal had not been exposed? Remember what was on foot, a real company-promoting effort of the worst type, several millions going to be embarked, several millions collected from poor, unsuspecting, credulous people on the strength of what two or three chance people, including a Deputy of the House, had put forward. But we got that quashed. There was also the inquiry into stock exchange transactions in connection with Great Southern Railways share dealings. That had a good result.
One of the good points about Parliamentary procedure is that Dáil question, the Parliamentary question, which can be addressed to any Minister about any part of his departmental activities and by means of which light can be shed upon whatever the Departments are doing or whatever the Minister is doing. That is a useful weapon for members of a Parliament to have against members of a Government. But it is only useful if the Parliamentary game is played, if the questions are answered truthfully, if they are answered from information brought before the Minister, which he honestly believes. That Stock Exchange Tribunal brought this out, that two questions answered by a responsible Minister were far from the truth—and that is written in the report for anybody to read.
Then we had what certainly was the occasion, if not the whole basis, of this motion, the recent Ward report. That did not arise from proceedings, or questions asked, in the House. It might more properly have it might have been better handled and they might have avoided the recent scandal of having to pay the costs, out of the tax-payers' pockets, of the two people engaged in that peculiar procedure which the Taoiseach set up. That was a useful inquiry, no matter how it started, and that is the sort of inquiry which would start from members having the right to ask questions and being able, by standing on privilege, to say, without any fear of court action, what they gathered from people, and the responsibility for saying which they took upon themselves.
It is clear that the occasion of this is the Ward matter. I think it is the basis of it. There are two points at issue. First of all, the Taoiseach likes to come before the House and the country and parade himself as the person who has been too interested in some high matter, such as cosmic physics, to notice what was going on under his eyes. When his attention is drawn to it, he then comes in with a cleansing motion. If this tribunal is only asked to report and brings in a report that he will like, everything will be happy. It will be happy to this extent, that there will not be the same leave to expose the type of Ward scandal that there was before. But by no means can it be accepted that the Ward type of scandal will not go on. In fact, it is all the more likely to go on as Parliamentary privileges weaken and members are not allowed to say their say without fear of consequences.
The occasion of this motion is the Ward report. It is the first time the Taoiseach mentioned it, and he dragged it in twice when dealing with that matter. He dragged it in when dealing with one part of that matter. The part about the undisclosed profits was so bad that nobody who had any thought for himself would but wish the thing dead and burried. But there had to be a gloss and the gloss was this, that one part of the Ward inquiry was dealing not with the legality, but with the propriety of Dr. Ward's activities in relation to certain medical officers, and the Taoiseach said that there was some doubt as to how far a man like the Parliamentary Secretary could engage in business. That was never questioned. The fact that Ministers are here recognised as having no other form of emolument except their Parliamentary emoluments and that Parliamentary Secretaries are not tied by the same rule gave the people the understanding that there was a cleavage as between the two types of offices and what people might make arising out of their Parliamentary associations.
But this was in dispute, whether a man elected as the representative of a constituency and getting into a position of authority should use that position over those subjected to him to make them do for him what they should not have been persuaded to do for other people. That was the whole gravamen of the charge against Dr. Ward that, being the man in charge of public health, he got medical officers to accept a lower rate of emolument than he was getting from the public health post; in other words, that he farmed out the post and made a little on it. We have to get that erected into a problem, something which requires public attention, something which requires investigation and with as little debate as possible. But we want a report on the matter, and if we can get a report from a prejudiced committee all the better, because then it may bind the House and at least the surface may be kept clean no matter what goes on in the depths.
When I say the occasions for this was the Ward inquiry I do not believe it is alone the occasion. People here cannot forget what was alleged against Deputy Briscoe, when it was notorious that ten times he had received accommodation to the extent of £50 when he was helping the people who paid him the £50— that ten times he got certain advantages through his association with Government Buildings. I suppose we have as a minor matter the fact that the Taoiseach thought that he might clean up this matter of Parliamentary vocabulary. There is a long history about the Parliamentary vocabulary. I was the victim of an attack by the Taoiseach when he wound up by remarking that what I had uttered was a falsehood. I challenged that matter and we had a discursive effort by the Taoiseach to the effect that falsehood is an objective type of statement, but to say "lie" would be entirely different because that would impute something to the person.
We left it and on a later occasion I used the word "falsehood" deliberately against a member of the Government. I was asked to withdraw and I pointed out in the House on that occasion that the word, ugly as it is, had been sanctioned and sanctified by its use by the Taoiseach in argument and had been accepted by the Chair and, notwithstanding that—and this again is on public record—on the understanding that this word was disappearing from our Parliamentary records and our vocabulary, I would withdraw, and that was accepted by the Chair on that condition. It was not accepted for long by the Taoiseach. Within a month, he was querying whether people were speaking the truth, and again he had his argument of what was objective and what was subjective and to say whether people were speaking the truth or not did not impute lying. Eventually the whole thing boiled up the other day when Deputy Flanagan was told not merely that what he said was untrue, was a falsehood, was even a lie, but that he was telling lies and that he was lying. If there is any man responsible for keeping that sort of vocabulary in this House, it is the man who moved the motion here to-day. So, of course, it is necessary, now that public attention has been attracted to that ugly vocabulary, now that public attention particularly has been attracted to the fact that Ministers may use terms which the ordinary Deputy is prohibited from using, to have a committee to gloss the whole thing over, and to have a whitewashing. If the committee is so constituted as to be guaranteed to bring in whatever the Taoiseach wants it to bring in, everyone will be happy.
What is aimed at in this motion? I have asked for explanations from more than one member who was in the House when the Taoiseach spoke. I asked whether he had given any examples that might have shocked the conscience of Deputies or might have persuaded them that some tightening of the reins was necessary or that Parliamentary procedure had been running amok. No such example was given, I was told, but we were told that the House desires protection from forces without the House, from the Press. And this is 1947! We have had many laws restricting the liberty of the Press, but almost as sacred as Parliamentary liberty has been the liberty of the Press. In the Constitution, the Press is guaranteed liberty to state their views, not excluding criticism of the Government. Now apparently we must be protected from the Press who are doing something to weaken the authority of this House. Surely the Taoiseach knows, because he is the author of most of it, that there is in this country the most compact bit of tyrannical law that any modern State has ever enacted to protect the community, the individual members of the Government and the institutions of the State against the sort of attack that he apparently fears? Quite recently the legislation we have down here was praised in the North, by people who have been paraded by our people as tyrants up there. They paraded our legislation in this matter as a worthy example, as showing how to stop the sort of activities that might bring the State to naught.
Does the Taoiseach not know that first of all he has the ordinary criminal law open to him? There are such things as seditious libels. I am sure he would not like to embark on bringing before the independent judges of this country any of the old types of action that passed under the heading of seditious libel. As the English community became more freedom-loving, the less did these actions appear in court because it was recognised that they were against the spirit of the people over there. Judges laughed these actions, when they were brought, out of court, with a very odd bad exception to the contrary. If the Taoiseach thinks that there is anything in the nature of sedition moving outside or anything in the nature of Press attacks which might disturb the State, if there are attacks on people in important positions in the State, he has the bench of independent judges before whom he can try his hand. What other example of breach of privilege by the Press has there been given? What outrageous articles have they written? Where has been the impact of anything they have done to undermine the foundations of the State which makes the Taoiseach come in here even to make a prima facie case against the Press to try to build up the suggestion that this House requires protection against something happening outside?
Apart from that, the Taoiseach must surely know of the vast powers he has under the Offences Against the State Act. The Taoiseach has got a definition of sedition there that will cloak him in almost anything he wants to bring if he has a scintilla of an action against anybody. The Taoiseach knows that right through that Act, there are multi-tudinous offences created and that one whole section of the Act is directed to getting a firm foundation for the various functionaries of the State and the various institutions of the State. It is well built because it has to be remarked that when the Taoiseach set about making that Act, all he had to do was to think of all he had himself done for 15 years and to guarantee that nobody else would do it again without falling foul of the criminal law. Under that Act, if a member of the Guards suspects that anybody has committed, is about to commit or is likely to commit any offence under any of the sections of the Act, or if he has any information relating to the commission or intended commission of any offence under that Act he can stop the person on the street, ask his name and address, search him and finally arrest him without a warrant. If the Taoiseach is driven to the worst—and it will be the worst—the man can be interned without trial.
If he can get any of his Ministers to sign a document scheduled to the Act, a document already printed and only requiring signature, stating that the Minister is of opinion that Mr. X is engaged in activities likely to be prejudicial, or which in his opinion are prejudicial, to the safety of the State, all that being done, Mr. X goes to jail and he stays there until the Minister relents or until a committee including one judge, finds, not that there are no legal grounds for retaining him, but that there are no reasonable grounds. If the Taoiseach can compel a judge to believe that there are reasonable grounds for holding a man in jail, that man will stay in jail.
With all these sources of power tapped ready for his use, what does the Taoiseach fear? What has happened outside? What is it that the Press have done, or is this all speculation about what they may do? Has the Taoiseach any case based on fact, based on something that has happened in our immediate past on which he can stand and ask this House to give him some better protection in its privileges against the Press than it has at the moment?
I am told that another of the Taoiseach's objectives in this motion is to protect people who are not Deputies or members of the Oireachtas against statements that may be made against them in this House. I suggest that any move that is made in that direction is a most dangerous one. I suggest that we should get the fullest protection in all that we say against people who are not members of this House. I say that we should get it all the more in these days when the opportunity of interested dealing—interested dealing in very lucrative business—has become easier and easier and when opportunities are being given to men, through privileged appointments made by the Government and not on the basis of merit—demonstrably not on the basis of merit, but which are made for the purpose of support of a financial kind and when companies are being promoted by the Government and people who are attached to Government and under the control of Government are being associated with such companies, particularly in the terrible situation that has been revealed by the Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Vocational Organisation. In those circumstances I think that we should be all the more strengthened in this House to deal with that situation which has developed so quickly and is still developing under our very eyes. Why should outsiders be protected against this privilege? What cases of abuse can it be alleged have occurred here in 15 years? Can the Taoiseach single out for me occasions upon which Deputies have said things harmful or derogatory of people outside this House where the Deputies have not had justification for what they did say? Is not the best safeguard that the country can have that its public representatives should be able to come in here and that, if they take on themselves the responsibility here of making a charge or asking a question which contains an insinuation against a person outside this House, Deputies should bear the odium resulting from their own conduct if their conduct is unworthy?
If a Deputy makes a statement here charging something against a person and it is found that that charge is unsustainable, that Deputy will suffer as a public man and that Deputy will suffer more as a public man than he may suffer hereafter as the result of some report of a Party committee after a Party trial and under conditions of secrecy.
I ask again, have there been abuses? What are they? Let us hear them so that we may deal with them and so that we may say, even although we want that priviliege with all its ancient historic associations and its value stressed and emphasised and proved down through the centuries—even although it is a big privilege—if there have been big abuses then we can remit our right to this privilege and we can allow ourselves to be hampered in some way in the freedom of speech that we now have in this assembly. I have heard no such case made. I am instructed that no such case was made here to-day. If that is so where is the necessity for our moving in this direction? We are now at a time in the history of the world when we have only just emerged from the worst situation ever known where two countries perfected themselves and perfected themselves, in the main, by choking down all public criticism and by turning their Parliamentary assemblies into places where those who were at the head of Government could only be applauded but could never be questioned. Under that type of iron certain, tyranny arose and it has taken an amazing amount of time, perseverance and virtue to eradicate it.
We are now being asked, without any case being made, to set up a committee to see whether we could not give way on a privilege which, if it never proved its value, certainly proved its worth through what happened when that privilege was not being worked or used in the last 20 years. I understand that the Taoiseach saw fit to drag into the debate two classes of people, business men—particularly business men who are Deputies—and lawyers. The present Ceann Comhairle was not long in office when I approached him personally on a particular matter. I asked him whether there was any way in which a Deputy like myself engaged in professional practice might let it be known in the House when there was some measure under discussion here in which he was interested and on which he desired to speak. I queried whether there was any system under which publicity could be given to that fact so that no innuendo could subsequently be levelled against me. I received a note from the Ceann Comhairle that Erskine May's Parliamentary Practice gave the British practice in relation to the matter and the Ceann Comhairle assured me that he thought that that was a satisfactory position. That is many years ago. I read what was in Erskine May's book. Incidentally, I found a change in the last edition from the edition to which the Ceann Comhairle then referred me. It is a change that may be of significance. Deputy Cosgrave read the matter here to-night: “It is contrary to the usage and derogatory to the dignity of this House that any of its members should bring forward, promote or advocate in the House any procedure or measure in which he may have acted or been concerned”—there used to be a comma there—“for any consideration or any pecuniary fee or reward.” As I understand it, the matter which is objected to is that a Deputy should speak in this House for fee or reward in connection with something in which he was previously engaged and not that he should speak in this House in connection with something outside in which he acted for fee or reward. In any event I am on the right side of the line no matter which interpretation is given to that phrase. I know of no lawyer who has broken that, but the insinuation had to be made. It is a very easy thing to libel a class and if one individual speaks in defence it can be said that he has missed the point but that, of course, there is somebody else in a worse case.
The Business man has also been talked about. It is not the first time in which the business man has been dragged into this discussion. The first occasion on which that occurred was the occasion upon which the Taoiseach was replying to Deputy Dillon and me when we raised the matter of a Deputy of this House having received financial accommodation during a period in which he was engaged in negotiation with a State Department. The Taoiseach introduced the example of a man who got some consideration at a time when he was using his endeavours with Government Departments to do those people some good and he tried to make the analogy between that precise case and all its attendant circumstances and the case of the business man who might go in to plead for something which might eventually affect himself and his business. I have heard no case made here against the Business man. I have heard no case made, at least, against the business man who is a member of this House. I have heard quite enough made here in speeches by members of this House and in conversation outside to make me realise that at this moment there never was so grave a necessity for members being protected by this ancient privilege under which they are allowed to speak against all people—business and otherwise. There never was so grave a need for members being protected from those men with the money bags putting the weight of their money against the free criticism to which they are subjected inside this House and which they could crush with their money if that criticism had to be made without that privilege.
Finally, we are asked now in this motion, without any case being made, to throw this ancient privilege—which has certainly had its value proved over the years in this House and particularly in recent years—to throw that ancient privilege over for an examination and a report. To whom? To a Party Committee. Is there any doubt of that? Will not this committee represent this House? Will it not be a majority committee which will report? And what a majority! Deputy McCarthy has been brought so often into this debate that he must now feel like an old performer in it.
Deputy McCarthy spoke here on the 14th February in connection with a certain debate. May I say, and I say it to his credit and not wanting to embarrass him, that it is not the first occasion I heard him speak against Party measures promoted by the Government he supports? As well as this occasion, I was here one night and, I am sure, embarrassed him by complimenting him on the speech he made in connection with tourist development, but in this debate he thrust himself in with this phrase:
"I speak on this question not from any Pilatical complex but from absolute conviction."
Deputy McCarthy was not going to ask where truth was in this matter and wash his hands of it. He spoke from absolute conviction. He went on to say:
"I know, of course, that if a division is challenged on the motion, under the Party system of Government I will have to go into the Lobby against my own convictions."
He was getting closer to Pilate at that point.
"As a Deputy, I often feel like one pulling against the current."
The Party current, I presume, was being talked of.
"It is so overwhelming that one has to go back and take another approach to his object."
You turn over several pages and there was a division and Deputy McCarthy voted against his conscience.
