This provision merely validates the elections which have taken place.
Committee on Finance. - Nurses Bill, 1961—Committee and Final Stages.
Section 1, agreed to.
SECTION 2.
Question proposed: "That Section 2 stand part of the Bill."
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 3.
Question proposed: "That Section 3 stand part of the Bill."
This provides for the payment of travelling expenses to members.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 4.
Question proposed: "That Section 4 stand part of the Bill."
This is to provide for a grant from the Minister for Finance to the Board.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 5.
Question proposed: "That Section 5 stand part of the Bill."
This is to ensure that the fees fixed by the Board will bring in sufficient revenue to meet that part of the expenditure which is not defrayed by the grant from the Minister.
Is the Minister satisfied that the nursing profession can meet, out of its own resources, the requirements initiated by this section?
Yes. The fees are very moderate.
Can the Minister assure the House that a situation is not likely to develop in which a charge will be made on the nursing profession——
There is the usual charge for entrance for examinations. After all, it is a profession.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 6.
Question proposed: "That Section 6 stand part of the Bill."
This provides that the Board will furnish to the Minister on request such information as he may require in relation to its operations.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 7
Question proposed: "That Section 7 stand part of the Bill."
This relates to the appointment of the Chairman of the Board.
Under this Section the Minister takes power to appoint the president of the Nurses' Board. We indicated on the Second Reading that this section appeared to be highly undemocratic. We are opposed to it for the reasons which we stated on the Second Reading. It is an unusual section to incorporate in a Bill of this kind and, so far as I can follow the reasons given by the Minister on the Second Stage, there does not appear to be any substantial reason why this change should be imposed.
The Minister says it is necessary that there should be an understanding between the Chairman of the Board and the Minister. That, to my mind, does not make sense. The Minister is entitled to representation on the Board.
He is entitled to have a point of view expressed on the Board and it is surely reasonable that the Nurses Board itself should be entitled to elect its own chairman as it has always done. I could understand if in relation to a board of this kind the experience had been that there was a sort of tug-of-war between the policy of the Minister and the policy of the board itself and if the result was that necessary progress had not been made. We know that the contrary is true. Since the establishment of the Nurses Board quite a dramatic measure of progress has been achieved and that, in my view, has been largely due to the fact that the Board had as its Chairman for many years a person who was dedicated to the advancement of the nursing profession in this country, providing them with a status they did not previously enjoy and with facilities for better training and better education. In those circumstances, where the story up to this has been a success story, it is difficult to understand why this unusual procedure is now being suggested.
If the Minister takes power, as he does under this section, to appoint the Chairman, he might as well abolish the Board entirely and provide that the interests of nurses and all that follows from that should be controlled and managed by the Department of Health. I found in my limited experience that it was a good thing in relation to boards of this kind concerned with interests outside the Department to have from time to time a fractious point of view put forward so that from a clash of opinion a good policy might result. Under the suggestion contained in this section there will be no possibility of any disagreement between the Department of Health and the Nurses Board. Everything will conform. The policy the Minister decides upon will be automatically carried out. There will be no possibility of disagreement. Everything in the garden will be lovely but, in the result, I doubt very much whether the interests of the nurses will be served as a priority. The priority will be the interests of the Minister for Health.
It was stated here on the Second Stage that doctors objected to nurses being chairmen. That is one of the reasons I thought this proposal of the Minister was best. I have received a letter from a doctor who was a member of the Board. He denies there was any truth in that statement. He states that at no time did the doctors feel there would be any loss of prestige if a nurse was made chairman. There was no objection to a nurse being made chairman of the Board. It is wrong in a democracy that any chairman should be appointed. Replying to the arguments used against this proposal, the Minister said there was no money involved in it, it was merely honorary.
The Deputy was talking about patronage and I was correcting him on that point.
There could be patronage because many people attach importance to position. People with money are always after position. Look at the people with money who would give a fortune for a title. Look at the people who spend money to become councillors, and there is no money in being a councillor. The Minister for the time being will be lobbied. In all walks of political life, there is patronage, and there always will be. I think it is wrong in principle that any person should be appointed to any board; the person should be elected. The Minister is not lacking in knowledge. He knows that when it comes to position, it would be contrary to human nature if there were no patronage. The Minister has left the position open to patronage by taking on himself to appoint a chairman. I am most emphatically against the Minister's proposal to appoint the chairman. The chairman should be elected by the Committee.
I think that every argument Deputy Sherwin has used against the proposal to have the President appointed by the Minister for Health for the time being, whoever he may be, could equally well be used against the system of election. We all know that in some circumstances elections may be decided not on questions of merit but on——
May I interrupt the Minister for a moment? The Minister is just speaking now?
Yes, we are in Committee on this.
The Seanad can be rigged and is rigged, but it is not as easy.
Wait now. That is where the Deputy is wrong. If an election is held inside a little body like this, where backs can be scratched to use that homely phrase, it cannot be challenged. If the Minister makes a wrong appointment and appoints a person unworthy of the position, it can be challenged, and I am perfectly certain it would be challenged here in Dáil Eireann. The fact that an appointment which did not commend itself to the judgment of the people had been made by the Minister would get the utmost publicity. It is not possible to do that in relation to these appointments to minor bodies. I am just suggesting that the position in which a responsible public man can be called to account for the appointment he makes is a very much better one——
That was Hitler's idea.
——from the point of view of the public interest than the system whereby little favours can be done—you vote for me and I will see you right the next time.
That was Hitler's idea. It can be used against democracy as a whole.
It was not Hitler's idea.
Yes, the Fuehrer system.
Do not take that short-sighted view. The Deputy is talking about democracy. Where could you have a more democratic assembly in this State or in any other State than Dáil Éireann? Are we not all democrats? Are we not elected by the people?
The Taoiseach does not appoint the chairman.
Are we not elected by the people to do the people's work? What is the relationship between An Bord Altranais and the Minister for Health? The Board is in fact the agent of the Minister for Health. It has no existence outside him. If he wants to find some other agent to perform all the functions of the Minister for Health, he can do so under the Act of 1950, under which the Board was brought into existence. It is only the agent of the Minister, established for the purpose of training and qualifying nurses to meet the public demand for members of that profession.
I cannot see what is wrong in giving to the Minister who has set up this Board under an Act of the Oireachtas the right to appoint a chairman, whose purpose will be to ensure that the Board works smoothly and in co-operation with the Minister for Health. I have no apology for taking up the attitude that it is of first importance for the public good that this and all other boards are to work in cordial co-operation with the Minister for Health.
Hitler said that.
One of the best ways of securing that is that there should be this liaison which I am proposing here in Section 7 of the Bill.
Deputy O'Higgins has said that this is unprecedented. I am surprised to hear him making that statement because, after all, I am following excellent precedents. I am sure if Deputy O'Higgins and I agree about the wisdom of doing a thing in a particular way, it is likely to be the best way of doing it. Deputy O'Higgins established Bord na Radhairc-mhaisteoirí and he appointed the chairman of that Board. It was a good choice. If he had not made that provision in the Act and had left the chairman to be elected by the members of the Board, perhaps the Board would not function at all, would not be functioning even yet. There would not be a neutral chairman to guide the Board in the performance of their functions and particularly in the formative stages of their development.
When the Deputy established the Voluntary Health Insurance Board, he not only appointed the chairman of the Board but he appointed all the directors. I am not making any point about that, but I do say he was wise to appoint the chairman of the Board. In the same way, there are a number of other associations which bear a similar relationship, as does An Bord Altranais, to the Minister for Health. There is the Cancer Association. It was not established by an Act of the Oireachtas. It was established under the Companies Acts. One might say, therefore, in that case that, since it is not formally a statutory body, the members of this company, limited as it is by guarantee, might be given the prerogative of electing their own chairman. But that was not the action taken by one of my predecessors.
The Chairman of the Cancer Association is appointed by the Minister. The Chairman of the Mass Radiography Association—again an association doing the work of the Minister, as agent for the Minister, as Bord Altranais is doing—is appointed by the Minister. I shall appoint in due course the Chairman of Comhairle Nimheanna. Again, the Medical Research Council is a body which has a similar relationship to the Minister as has Bord Altranais, though it is again a company limited by guarantee. It receives, as Bord Altranais does, a subvention from the Government out of the Exchequer. In that case also the Chairman is appointed by the Minister.
There is nothing unprecedented in what I am now proposing. My experience is that matters tend to go better and work tends to make better progress if there is that association through the Chairman between the Minister and these subsidiary agents of his. There is no question about democracy in this. This Board could not exist for a minute if the Oireachtas decided not to supply it with funds. It could not operate unless it was prepared to charge very heavy fees to those who qualify under it or those who sit for its examinations. In those circumstances it does not seem to me that there is any question of the infringement of any right. It is merely the fact that the Minister is entitled to have in this matter a choice, and the choice in this particular case will not be exercised, I think, by me because the existing Chairman is to continue in office for the remainder of the period in which the present Board will exist. After that, the choice of President of the Board will probably be made by another person.
The Minister is not retiring?
Time is moving on, you know, and we do not have full control over the period that is left to us. As I was saying, I am perfectly certain that, when an appointment comes to be made under this section, it will be made with full advertence to the wishes of the Board and to the qualifications of the person to be appointed.
Will nurses be excluded?
Nobody will be excluded.
The innuendo was that a doctor would not accept a nurse as Chairman.
I am not responsible for any innuendoes. Neither do I know what transpired at meetings.
The Minister says he is not responsible for any innuendoes. Surely the Minister is responsible for anything he manufactures himself? The innuendo to which Deputy Sherwin refers emanated from the Minister.
No.
It was the Minister who stated on Second Reading the point that Deputy Sherwin has very rightly and properly raised now.
No.
It was one of the Minister's Party. It was Deputy Briscoe who said it.
I must apologise. It was Deputy Briscoe. The Minister says this is not unprecedented. I should like to assert again that it is unprecedented. I know of no Board—the Minister can check this—where the constitution and the manner in which the chairman is appointed has been changed as this is being changed by legislation. This Board has been in existence ever since the Principal Act of 1950. That is over eleven years. It has been functioning, operating, carrying out its statutory duties and providing for the training of nurses and the supply of nurses in this country. The Board is there. It is an unprecedented action on the part of any Minister to come in here to change the manner in which that particular Board —it is not a new Board, not appointed ad hoc—will elect its President or Chairman.
It is perfectly true that the Chairman of Bord Radhaircmhaisteoirí, which was appointed under legislation for which I was responsible, is appointed by the Minister. That is an ad hoc Board appointed to deal with a new problem, a new situation. The Minister is aware that, at that particular time, the tide and tug of a variety of interests made it impossible for any Minister to take any other course except to appoint a Chairman. That is why the Chairman of that Board is nominated by the Minister. But that was as I say ad hoc, a particular situation. There is no question of election in relation to the Voluntary Health Insurance Board. That Board was set up to deal with a particular public and social duty. Not only the Chairman, but the entire Board, is appointed by the Minister.
In argument it is always possible to get an example to suit the particular point one is making, but here is the Minister asking this House to change the constitution of an existing and successful Board. It is a Board, taking what the Minister said on Second Reading and the experience we have had of it, that has been extraordinarily successful. Since it was established it has helped the nurses of this country up from the ground. Through its activities it has provided a new vision and given a new breath of life where nurses are concerned. They have to-day better training facilities. They have opportunities in the universities for better education. It is on the way to solving the perennial problem of premises and methods of training for young nurses. It has been a successful Board. Why should this change be proposed now? It is part of the kind of complex the Minister has had over the past four and a half years. This method—I cannot say "of electing" any more—by which a member of the Nurses Council becomes president has got to be changed because the Minister did not like the person who was president for a number of years. That is why this change is proposed.
I am sorry Deputy Briscoe is not here now because Deputy Briscoe attended his first meeting of the Nurses Board some two years ago for the purpose of voting out the person who for many years was the architect of the success of An Bord Altranais. It is because that attempt failed that now the power of election is being taken by this section from the Nurses Board. It is because they did not perform in accordance with the Ministerial wishes two years ago and because they exercised their right to re-elect as president a person in whom they had complete confidence that this section is now brought in to take that right from them. I have no doubt whatever that is the motive behind this section.
The Minister says his experience in matters of this kind is to the effect that matters go better if there is, as he said, "that association between the Minister and these subsidiary agencies of his" and he interpreted "that association" as meaning agreement between the Minister and the subsidiary agency. The subsidiary agent in this respect is An Bord Altranais.
We are supposed to be a democracy. That is how we regard ourselves in our Constitution. A democracy surely means that from the free play of independent opinion and vigorously held thought, reason, often a compromise, may result but what the Minister wants, and it is in accordance with the Minister's point of view, is his opinion translated automatically, not only in the Department but in relation to every subsidiary agency outside. That all adds up to the definition of dictatorship and this section is clearly undemocratic. It is to make An Bord Altranais, what it never has been, some kind of doll that will perform according as the Minister for Health pulls the strings. I think it is wrong. I think it is unprecedented. As I have indicated already, I do not know of any legislation in which the constitution of an existing board has been assailed and changed in this remarkable manner. In my view, this change is motivated by the Minister's displeasure with the person who for many years was a most successful and most respected president of the Nurses Board.
I just wish to say that I am more than surprised that Deputy O'Higgins's memory tends to mislead him. He has painted a picture to the House of a long-term servant of the public being deprived of an office because a Minister does not like him. I shall not enter into the merits or demerits of the ex-president of this board. I had not anything to do with the "ex-ing" of him. Apparently, some people had persuaded him that it was better for him to retire and he did retire in 1960, having served from 1956 to 1960— four years. His predecessor, I think, was given a fair hint by certain interested parties that he might not be elected and the person about whom Deputy O'Higgins is so much concerned had not the slightest hesitation in displacing him.
There have been since 1951 four presidents of that body, the late Dr. P. McCarville, then his successor who held office for, apparently, only one year, and then the gentleman about whom Deputy O'Higgins is so much concerned. Since that person was not elected president of the Board in 1961, I do not think he has any reason to complain or that Deputy O'Higgins had any reason for the indignation he has expressed in the House. He will not be affected by this, nor will his successor. His successor remains under this Bill as president of the Board. I cannot see what all the fuss is about.
The Deputy has been throwing bouquets at An Bord Altranais and, particularly at the person with whom he is so much concerned. He has told us that they have solved the very difficult problem of premises. Of course, they have solved it—with moneys provided by whom? By the Minister for Health who allocated to them £5,500 for the purchase of their premises and it is to the Minister for Health that in that respect the credit is due. It is not that I am concerned about it but since we have had this picture painted, this glowing picture of the services which a certain person has rendered to the nursing profession, may I say that he had predecessors and he has a successor, all of whom have done their job, I am sure, just as well as he? And in so far as they are going to have premises, they are going to have premises because the Minister for Health let them have the money for them. That is all there is to it.
Question put and declared carried.
Sections 8 and 9 agreed to.
Schedule agreed to.
Title agreed to.
Bill reported without amendment.
Agreed to take remaining Stages today.
Bill received for final consideration and passed.