Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 7 May 1975

Vol. 280 No. 8

Private Members' Business. - Appointment of Ombudsman: Motion (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That Dáil Éireann favours the appointment of an ombudsman.—

—(Deputy O'Brien.)

Parliamentary Secretary to the Taoiseach (Mr. Kelly)

Yesterday I explained that, in my view, while the idea of having an ombudsman is a useful one here, the reasons which were decisive in the adoption of the idea elsewhere did not seem to me to exist here. I said I did not think that there was any serious degree of maladministration here of the kind which produced demands for such an office in Britain. I said that, even for the minute percentage of actual maladministration, it might nonetheless be well argued that we ought to have such an official as an ombudsman in order to give the public the assurance that this minute percentage of cases, small though it was, would not go unremedied.

It seems to me that the main burden of the case for the ombudsman must rest in a country like this on somewhat different grounds. Moreover it seems to me, as I said in concluding yesterday, that the limitations placed on the Parliamentary Commissioner in the United Kingdom, namely, that he can act only if the inquiry is instituted by an M.P., and that local government and matters of total discretion are excluded from his view, would make him completely unsuitable for adoption here. It is exactly in the field of matters which are discretionary and in local government matters that difficulties for the citizen can arise. I do not mean difficulties resulting from maladministration but difficulties in the sense that the citizen finds himself up against a machine by which he is baffled and feels himself unequipped to attack or to challenge.

I want to talk for a few minutes about another matter. I hope I will not be accused by Deputies on any side of the House of trying to reform an entire system to which I myself am a relative newcomer, and of finding fault with a system which others have lived under quite happily, and prosperously, and usefully for many years before I was heard of. I am not trying in any way to lecture people who have spent very useful public lives. I should like to make a point of view heard which very seldom surfaces in this House, I suppose, because the people who are in this House find that it is difficult to utter this point of view without invalidating some of the planks on which their own political existence is built.

The main large scale problem which the Irish people and their politicians have to deal with in the area which Deputy O'Brien has so wisely and so admirably driven us into yesterday and today, is the problem of divorcing the dispensing of administrative favour from the achievement of political support. Administrative decisions at absolutely all levels from the highest to the lowest, from the awarding of a contract for the building of a £5 million underpass, or bridge, or tunnel, down to the simplest and humblest appointment in some kind of a local setting or the simplest and humblest according of a medical card, ought to be made on entirely objective criteria. While there is no point in my denying that all sides in this House have been excercising their governmental powers when they were in office in a way which conflicted with these criteria and while there is no point in my denying that patronage has existed here since the State was founded, someone must say here sooner or later unambiguously that essentially it is wrong and that ideally we ought to be without it.

I do not want to take a high and mighty attitude towards this. I must confess that I have become a great deal less high and mighty about it since I was elected to the other House six years ago and since I have seen at close quarters exactly how the political world works and, in particular, what the people expect of the political world. I do not want to be high and mighty on this theme. I do not feel that way about it any longer. One ought not to lose touch with and sight of the ideals with which one started out. It is important to say, and keep on saying, and keep as an ideal in front of one, even if it is only an ideal of perfection such as a human being never can attain, that anything like patronage is wrong.

It may be that the expectations which the people have of us—and we are responsible to them and we have to reflect their points of view and their wishes in a large degree—force us, whichever side is in question, to ride along with this system up to a point. It may be that there are strong human reasons for going along with it, and that these human reasons would outweigh, and would outweigh even in the sight of the most just and the best man who ever lived, the ideal textbook reasons against patronage.

I do not underestimate these reasons at all. For example, very shortly after we took office I began to notice through the volume of post on my table that a very large number of people who support my party and the Labour Party were anxious—I will not call it for promotion I do not mean promotion in the sense of stepping up one rung of the ladder in a particular setting—for some kind of appointment or dispensation of which their known political affiliations had in the 16 previous years deprived them. I hope gentlemen on the far side of the House will not think I am being contentious about this. I do not mean to be. I am trying to state it as fairly as I can and no doubt they will interrupt me if I go beyond the bounds of fairness.

I noticed in these representations, which I passed on to the people concerned—some of which were successful and some of which were not—that the people who were making these representations were not so much concerned with getting jobs; they were not so much concerned with putting money in their pockets; they were not so much concerned even with having status; what they were concerned with was something more humble and more radical than that. They wanted recognition.

They wanted recognition from their friends that their years—and at times it seemed they would be endless—of slaving thanklessly in a hostile political climate watching plums, favours, recognition of all kinds, going to their opponents, going to people with whom they did not politically agree and could not bring themselves politically to agree with, were now at an end. They wanted reassurance that they would be seen to be at an end by the smile of Government favour, a Government favour which was at the disposal of the people whom they had helped into office, for what were undoubtedly at the time entirely unselfish and public-spirited reasons. I could not bring myself to despise a man who feels that way. I am certain that the Deputies opposite, if they were to remain in Opposition for 16 years as we did, would feel the same way about it when they got in. There are those who now work for them, and I recognise that there are members of the Fianna Fáil Party who do not mind doing this. Although it is not a good moment to be a member of Fianna Fáil I hope no ruthless discrimination is being exercised against them. I recognise and applaud people who feel that the interests of the Irish people are served by supporting a democratic Opposition, and they should not be discriminated against for doing so. If they pass 16 years and find at the end of that period that their political affiliation has debarred them for membership of this board or that committee I could not blame them for expecting that when Deputies Dowling and Moore are over on this side of the House, they would bestow favour on them which we had not bestowed.

That lengthy introduction to what I want to say is only meant to exonerate me from the charge of taking a high-line about this. I do not take a high-line about it at all. We are all one people and we are similar enough, particularly in the roots from which we sprang, and there is no sense in trying to hammer into our neighbour or a 100 of our neighbours a point of view which one may have learned only through the fortunate experience of never having had to go begging to anybody for anything. I do not, accordingly mean these remarks in that way.

We must acknowledge on all sides of the House that patronage is wrong. There may be extenuating circumstances of the kind I have described, there may be all kinds of human circumstances which make the fault for the seeking or the exercising of patronage diminish to vanishing point but it remains wrong. It would be a poor day if we found ourselves as a House constructing casuistic excuses for the continuance of a system which we know is wrong.

There is a distinction between the Fine Gael and Labour Parties on the one hand and the purses of the people of Ireland on the other. Three years ago there was a clear distinction, or so it seemed to me, between the private concerns of the Fianna Fáil Party and the purse of the people of Ireland. It seemed to me then and it still seems to me that whatever benefits whether great or small or whatever work, jobs, favours or recognition of any kind dispensed in the name of the people of Ireland ought to be done on objective criteria irrespective of the political affiliation of the people concerned.

When we were in Opposition I watched that principle being flagrantly ignored, although to a lesser extent I see it being ignored now, but to a much lesser extent for a reason I will explain later.

Mr. Power

The Parliamentary Secretary must have his tinted glasses on.

Mr. Timmons

The Parliamentary Secretary must have had his tongue in his cheek.

Mr. Kelly

The duty lies on us, particularly at a moment like this on Private Members' time when, perhaps, a flag of truce is flying over the trenches to some extent, when the motion is introduced by a Government Deputy to make these admissions and to pull ourselves together and to ask ourselves whether we might revise our whole view of the political and administrative world to accommodate them. This brings me back to the subject of Deputy O'Brien's motion. An ombudsman, or something like that, would be acceptable and valuable if he was intended as a weapon against the exercise of favour in any shape or form based on political or similar criteria. There is no such thing as absolute justice in this world and anyone, even a man who sets out intending to exercise no favour or political patronage, may end up making a worse appointment than if he had exercised political patronage. That possibility is open. There are strong reasons also, apart from politics, in the case of doubt of appointing the man one knows you can trust rather than the man one does not know.

There may be a strong case for some office like this which would be enabled to nullify acts of an administrative kind from the highest to the lowest, if satisfied that these acts were discriminatory in the sense that they were inspired by political favour for one side or disfavour for the other. I use the word "political" in the broadest sense; I do not just mean the three parties here. I mean "political" in the broadest sense or any kind of criteria even a non-political one which was not related or capable of being usefully related to the purpose of the benefit, job or contract in question.

Earlier I said I believed there was less of this and I hope we will get less of it as time goes on. A substantial step was made by the Prosecution of Offences Bill which has taken the dispensing of what is now roughly £250,000 per year out of political hands and into non-political hands. That money used to be dispensed by all sides on an almost entirely political basis. That has now ended. There are people who regret its passing. That has now ended in consequence of a political initiative for the promotion of which the Attorney General was responsible.

In brute political terms the Coalition Government have struck out of their own hands a very powerful political weapon. They have done that in the public interest. The sum involved is not small and spread over a relatively small profession it can buy a great deal of support. It can buy a great number of speeches during by-election time, Presidential election time or general election time. It can buy a great number of subscriptions or many plates at dinners. We have struck that weapon out of our own hands because we thought it was in the public interest to do so and because we thought the legal business ought to be discharged by the best people available whatever their political affiliation. I am proud to be working for a Government that sponsored that and I hope it is only the beginning of a process which will lead in the end to the entire depoliticisation of the administrative process at all levels. I would like to see it go a bit faster. I began by saying that I recognise the human strength of the forces which make it go fairly slow.

We often hear criticism of the judicial appointments. In connection with those so far I have not felt the necessity to apologise for them because those appointed to judicial office in the last two years were men who, under the kind of system I would like to see, would have been appointed to judicial office long ago. In other words, we have a long backlog to catch up with and a small number of jobs becoming vacant. I admit that excuse will not hold good forever and that the time will shortly come when we will expect to see judicial appointments made among people who have associations other than with the Coalition. I certainly would not go looking for people with associations with Fianna Fáil because that would be going from the frying pan into the fire, but people with associations other than with the Coalition. I know some very deserving people who have not yet been met with the office which their talents and their experience would deserve. I think that excuse holds good but it will not hold good for ever. I hope in the case of judicial appointments we will see this Government introduce the same kind of procedure as in dispensing £250,000 worth of legal work every year to members of the Bar.

If an ombudsman was an individual officer or the apex of a system of advice bureaux, his main function would be to ensure that decisions were fair. We would not wish to have the spectacle of people expecting to get favoured treatment from their side when in office and less favoured treatment when they were out of office.

Apart from the question of patronage there is a question somewhat lower down the scale which is also connected with the ombudsman. A pyramid of advice bureaux, with the ombudsman the ultimate court of appeal, would be the ideal solution. It is human weakness that leads a public representative into allowing people to imagine something they have got, to which they were entitled and which they would have got if the public representative concerned had never been born, was obtained as a result of that public representative's intervention.

I have often been thanked by my constituents for something they have got and I try to say to them that they were entitled to it anyway but ingrained in them is the idea that they would not have got it but for the public representative's help. However, I find myself slipping and am inclined to think that perhaps they would not have got it so fast but for my intervention and I suppose in time I will find myself taking the credit. It is outrageous that an elected representative could think of taking credit for, say, getting somebody a house. He does not use a penny of his own in getting that house apart from what he pays by way of rates and taxes, which does not differentiate him from the rest of his fellow-citizens. He has no right to pull the wool over people's eyes, or allow them to pull the wool over their own eyes which is really the point.

I do not want to criticise public representatives for trying to stem the flow of thanks they receive—they would need to be superhuman to do that. The fact that people are encouraged to believe that the dispensing of administrative favours is in some way linked with political affiliation and that the intervention of a political representative is necessary before they get what they are entitled to is an unfortunate development and one I would like to see abandoned. The office of ombudsman and a pyramid of advice bureaux of junior ombudsmen based locally would do a great deal of good.

I hope what I have said this evening will not be taken as a high and mighty castigation of my colleagues. Everything I said applies equally to myself and my own party. In Private Members' time Deputies could throw away party affiliations and look at a problem like this in the large perspective and see if this important element of our political life could be changed for the better. On both sides of the House we could come together in order to achieve that.

Mr. Timmons

I shall not detain the House very long. I support this motion. It may not be necessary to have a full-time ombudsman; a part-time one might be sufficient. There are occasions when constituents in all parts of the country are reluctant to approach their local elected representative and at such time they could have recourse to a man who was above politics, a man of the highest integrity and one respected in the community. There is a case for appointing such a man on an experimental basis.

All parties who have succeeded in electing public representatives, whether at Dáil level or county council level, are very closely in touch with the people. One has only to see the provincial papers and read where Deputies announce their intention to meet constituents at various times and places. I am more concerned with people who are reluctant to go to public representatives and, in that context, I support the appointment of a part-time ombudsman on an experimental basis.

The motion should embrace public institutions and it could be extended to private commercial institutions. Week after week the columns in evening newspapers are devoted to ventilating people's problems. The newspapers are to be congratulated on this service because not alone do they seek solutions to the various problems presented to them but they also receive subscriptions for charitable institutions. In that context the activities of a part-time ombudsman would not alone help public institutions but would also help commercial concerns and the commercial life of this country.

Mr. Enright

I support the motion, in the name of Deputy Fergus O'Brien, that Dáil Éireann favours the appointment of an ombudsman. I believe this House can certainly recommend the appointment of an ombudsman. People may get the impression that we are critical of our civil servants or present form of administration. I have not been very long in this House but in the time I have been here I have come to realise that we have one of the finest public services in the world. In our civil servants we have officials who are honest, dedicated, hardworking and completely devoted to their duties. I am sure in saying this I am voicing the opinion of everybody in this House.

The appointment of an ombudsman is something that I believe is necessary in the public interest. My reason for saying so is that there have been numbers of people over the years who have had genuine complaints. They felt that some particular Department of State did not deal with their cases in a fair manner. They felt that the Departments were wrong, they felt let down and they felt that they had been steamrolled by public bodies. They felt that they had not got the necessary finance, the necessary ability or the necessary energy to stand up and fight to have their complaints investigated. We must ensure that no person has a grievance that has not been investigated. We will have to have some method of investigating each and every complaint. This, I believe, should work through every channel in our public service. Many people have the idea that they have not been treated as fairly as they should have been. In order to ensure that justice is not alone done but is seen to be done I believe this is the best course to take.

In this House we have, in the system of Dáil Questions, one of the greatest safeguards of any democracy. Each and every Deputy has a right to table a question which will have to be answered by a particular Minister within three days. This is a great privilege and a great safeguard for the democratic institutions. Nevertheless, some people feel that the replies they receive to Parliamentary Questions are often brief. A Deputy may not have sufficient information to question a Minister further in regard to the reply to a Parliamentary Question. For this reason it may be said that the Parliamentary Question is not sufficient. The matter can again be raised on the Adjournment if a Deputy is not satisfied with the reply he has received but, nevertheless, again the Deputy may not have sufficient information and may not have the facts that are on the Minister's file. After the appointment of an ombudsman the ombudsman will have the right to call upon the Secretary or the Minister of a Department to produce the files so that he can study them. As far as I am aware, an ombudsman can ask for the official dealing with the case and ask him to give information relating to a particular case. I believe an ombudsman would be an addition to and would strengthen the rights Dáil Deputies have to seek information through Dáil Questions. It would certainly be a help to Deputies and would strengthen the hand of Seán Citizen if his grievance could be investigated and looked into by somebody on his behalf. He could then see the full facts as they appear from an administrative point of view.

Another advantage in this, and we should not overlook this point, is that it would help to do away with the unfavourable coverage in the Press that some Departments get at present. There are times when a Government Department may not be able to have their points of view put across to the general public. I believe that an ombudsman would, could and should be able, after a grievance has been reported to him to issue a statement or recommendation pointing out that the civil servants were acting within their authority and scope. This would be of benefit to the civil servants in their jobs. It would cut both ways and be of benefit to both sides. The ombudsman, in this sphere, could strengthen the democratic institutions. For this reason I believe the creation of this post would be well worth while.

Most county councillors and urban councillors—I do not know about Dáil Deputies—give their time on a voluntary basis. They do trojan work on behalf of their constituents. Not half enough tribute is paid to people working at local level. This House should pay tribute to them for the very fine work they carry out. Their motives are of the highest possible character. Most of them are interested in seeing that the democratic system we cherish is upheld. They help to ensure that the democratic system is working properly, but the same can be said of Deputies who work hard for their constituents. However, in this particular sphere I think an ombudsman could help in reducing the work load of Dáil Deputies, county councillors and urban councillors. It would give the Members of this House and the Members of the Seanad more time to read and study legislation going through the House. This is necessary and would be good for our democratic system. Those are my views on the appointment of an ombudsman.

All Deputies could be described, in a limited way, as ombudsmen. The system has worked quite successfully in the past but any system, whatever it is, can always be improved. We have one of the finest democratic systems but that fact should not make us sit back and not progress. We should endeavour to improve at all times. The appointment of an ombudsman would help to improve the situation and be of benefit to every citizen. I commend the proposal and support it.

Mr. Moore

The time for discussion is now very limited. Deputy O'Brien believes that the appointment of an ombudsman would serve the people better. He is one of the few people on the Government benches who believe this. I am not convinced that it is necessary or unnecessary. I agree with the Parliamentary Secretary that it is not a good enough reason that we should have an ombudsman because they have one in Britain. That would be one of the worst reasons. I would have liked to have had more time to deal with the Parliamentary Secretary's dissertation on the distribution of legal largesse by the Fine Gael Party. It may be a case of middle-class values, the fact that he boasts that the Government have not been discriminatory in regard to legal appointments. This may not be relevant but I should like to reply to the Parliamentary Secretary very briefly and say that at least the Fianna Fáil Party appointed a Chief Justice who was diametrically opposed to them politically. We set the headline there. If the Government are following that headline I am glad to see it. We tried to introduce fair play in this area. That is all I will say on that as I have not much time left.

An Ceann Comhairle

I can allay the Deputy's anxiety. The Deputy is concerned about time. He has ample time.

Mr. Kelly

It is a courtesy of Deputy Moore because I passed him a note to say that the Minister for the Public Service, who intends to give the Government's point of view, is held up in the Seanad on the Finance Bill but he is trying to get in here to state the Government's view briefly before Deputy O'Brien replies. In consideration of that I think Deputy Moore does not intend to use the whole half-hour.

An Ceann Comhairle

I see. Thank you.

Mr. Moore

The next motion on the Order Paper is in the name of Deputy Colley and is about the appointment of people in Aireacht which we hope will soon come before the Dáil and the suitability of people, that before they are appointed to any public office we should know of their suitability for these posts. This is what worries me: if we appoint an ombudsman, by what standards do we appoint him? What power will he be given? In Britain, the office of ombudsman is so tied up with conventions and restrictions that the system does not really work. Last night, Deputy O'Brien said that in Sweden 1,000 cases were dealt with in a year. This is not very many. Is an ombudsman suitable for the Irish scene? Should we not examine our society first and then say that what we want, if anything, is a certain type of person who would serve the people better than they are being served at present but at the same time would not be a curb on elected representatives? Let us take the case that a person considers something to be unconstitutional. We have had many cases, including Trade Union Bills, and so on, which the President is empowered to refer to the Supreme Court. Would this man have the power to refer the fluorine scheme, the contraceptive issue or even the Sunningdale challenge to the Supreme Court? I do not know what power he will be given. He will not be elected but appointed. Therefore, he cannot take precedence over elected representatives. To give him such precedence would be to take from the people certain power. We must render an account of our stewardship to the people. Deputy Power asked who should vet the ombudsman. The one great thing about democracy is that the public can vet our actions or inaction. This is a great safeguard. I am worried as to the powers we should give an ombudsman.

The Parliamentary Secretary referred to the hoary old story about politicians encouraging people to believe that only through them can the people obtain their rights. I do not believe that. I have never met a Deputy who practised this.

Mr. Coogan

Why hold clinics then?

Mr. Moore

You must help people. A person can go to the doctor. He will not promise to cure that person but at least he will advise him. The same applies to the politician; he will advise people. He cannot say he will get them a job or a house or anything else.

Mr. Coogan

The doctor can cure the situation.

Mr. Moore

So would we. The Fianna Fáil Deputies tried to cure it all right.

(Interruptions.)

An Ceann Comhairle

Order. Deputy Moore is in possession.

Mr. Moore

There is a very high standard on this side of the House. The people come to us. The point I am making is that we do not promise them anything. The State in its wisdom has created a system through the people whereby certain benefits are available to the people. Life is becoming so complicated nowadays that people need someone to advise them. An ombudsman would never have the close relationship with the people which an active Deputy has. If he is an honest politician he will tell the people whether they are entitled to something or not, or else he will make inquiries. If we did not perform this function democracy would have folded up long since. It is to the credit of all parties that we do this work.

Mr. Coogan

Is it not our first duty to legislate?

Mr. Power

When did the Deputy legislate?

(Interruptions.)

An Ceann Comhairle

Order.

Mr. Moore

We are sent here primarily as legislators. We must not lose the common touch about which Kipling wrote. One can know the anxieties of people when one meets them. Even if there were 1,000 ombudsman you must have the elected representative, who will have what the people want embodied in legislation. The ombudsman would be limited in scope. To have wise and good legislation it must come from the people, but through active representatives. We all know from history that before education became so widespread and when there was a very degree of illiteracy, there would be one man sitting in the market square who could write letters. He was probably the forerunner of the modern ombudsman. People might be so well informed that they would know their rights, their privileges and their responsibilities so that there would be no need for them to come near an ombudsman or even a public representative. We may try to reach a Utopian situation but we may not make much progress. Members of the British Parliament boast about how easy it is for their constituents to see them, but here constituents can see their representatives almost at any time they wish. We should not follow the example of other countries. An ombudsman may be very suitable to British or Swedish society but may not be suitable here. Surely it is in the sphere of industrial relations that we need the super ombudsman, that in the Department of Labour we have rights officers who, when called upon by the trade unions or employers, will investigate any one case. Therefore, the Department of Labour might well, in the new legislation that is promised, examine the setting up of this industrial ombudsman, not just rights officers who are civil servants, who are competent and who do a tremendous amount of good in trying to solve some of the knotty problems of industrial relations. I do not think we need an ombudsman to deal with ordinary situations but I would agree with Deputy O'Brien to the extent that we need a figure who would give us more hope for the avoidance of industrial strife, that we would have a person who would ensure that no worker or employer would have to suffer any unjustice because there was no one he could go to to have a case investigated. One may ask why, since the Labour Court is in existence, he cannot go there. Thank heavens most people do but we have disastrous strikes, nevertheless. Therefore, the appointment of an ombudsman would not be the complete answer to what Deputy O'Brien is after though I agree with him that it might help.

I do not wish to delay the House much longer. I shall not oppose the motion but I do not consider it to be the answer to the problem. The Government should not give much time to the consideration of this matter. It was incorporated in their policy for the last election and I suspect what they will do with this one now is to try and keep face with the public on this aspect. I would suggest to the Minister who is present, the Minister for Finance and the Public Service, that he would direct his whole efforts into having this industrial relations ombudsman or umpire because we know that a colleague of his may have a strike of civil servants on his hands very shortly. It is ironical that it should be the Minister for Labour who is to be involved in the strike. Here we are threatened with a strike of civil servants regarding an industrial matter but to whom could they appeal? How will that strike be resolved? If we had the ombudsman now they could have gone to him to seek help, saying that they believe the Minister for Labour to be wrong in recruiting outside labour. In this way a strike might be averted. But faced now with a strike, somebody will have to be put on a pedestal, somebody who will act as an industrial relations officer, to act as intermediary between the Minister and his civil servants. Otherwise I see a chaotic state of affairs in the offing. Because of the eloquent plea made by Deputy O'Brien I will not oppose the motion but I do not believe it to be the answer to many of our ills.

Minister for the Public Service (Mr. R. Ryan)

Deputy O'Brien is to be congratulated on tabling this motion asking Dáil Éireann to reflect for a few hours upon this very important topic. Deputy O'Brien recognises that administrative action in many cases matters a great deal more than private action and private decisions. The State or public authority today can have an immense effect on the well being of individual citizens through systems of grants, pensions, benefits, some of them discretionary. Others are people's entitlements under the law, but persons making decisions in relation to applications are humans and may themselves make human error in passing judgment. Other areas where the State has an immense effect upon people's fortunes are areas of licensing, commissions, prohibitions and many other fields. One Max W. Abrahamson, a constitutional lawyer of note in Dublin, some years ago said something which might appear to be harsh but which I am sure was not intended as such but was simply recognising man's propensity not always to be correct. He said: "It is generally if not universally admitted that politicians and officials are flesh and blood and we have enormous evidence from many fields that it follows from this alone that a proportion of their decisions will be unreasonable, negligent, biased and even dishonest". If that judgment was one which was universally applicable, it would be both harsh and wrong. But in so far as it identifies the possibility of error, there is a good case to be made for having an ombudsman. I am long enough in this House not to hold any illusions about the effectiveness of the weapon of the parliamentary question.

I am not satisfied in my own experience, either as an Opposition critic or as a Government spokesman, that the rights of individuals can in all cases be sufficiently ventilated by means of a parliamentary question or that wrong done can in all cases be righted by that means. You, Sir, like the rest of us are governed by the Standing Orders which permit only certain matters to be raised in the course of questions. There are limits on matters which can be raised on the Adjournment. In a forum of this nature where histrionics can sometimes take precedence over precision and incisive comment, there is a possibility that even the most well-intentioned Deputies and Ministers may not come to the kernel of the matter. Many issues which an ombudsman could examine and ventilate in the quiet of his office can never be sufficiently processed through the means of the parliamentary question.

While accepting the importance in our democratic system of maintaining the parliamentary question as the best means of keeping the Minister and his Department on their toes I am not satisfied that that is the best method for ventilating the grievance of an individual citizen.

I remember some years ago being chastised because I raised by way of a parliamentary question the difficulty of a widow in a Dublin suburb whose window had been blown off the house because an employee of the local authority in question had negligently left the window ajar on a windy day. Six months later when that good lady had obtained no redress whatever and still had a gaping hole in the wall, I asked the question here and I was chastised by some of our friends of the Fourth Estate for bringing this matter before Parliament. That was a case where the parliamentary question worked to great advantage. The window was installed in 24 hours. So cases can arise where the parliamentary question is a useful weapon. However where a person's intimate and confidential affairs are involved in an administrative decision it is not possible to ventilate such cases by way of a parliamentary question. To some extent they can be dealt with by way of representations direct to a Minister or Departmental officials. But there is a natural human tendency on the part of any public authority, its officials or political heads, to take up a defensive attitude when criticised and to justify a decision already taken when it is questioned.

Other countries with an ombudsman or investigator of administrative affairs, have found that the vast majority of complaints were not well-founded. All countries with an ombudsman have found that cases have come to light through the system of having an ombudsman where wrong had been done and right was probably done because the system of ombudsman existed.

Departments of State and public authorities are probably not the best judges of their own conduct. It is probably a healthy thing to have their conduct looked at by some independent authority. Life is becoming more complex. Citizens, individually and collectively, are becoming more dependent on the State, not because the State as an entity has sought to get extra powers for itself, but because society has called on the community, through the State, to provide welfare services, health services, educational services; because society has obliged the State to protect the public good with rules for physical planning, because the community has conferred upon the public authority rights of compulsory purchase in the public interest. In the exercise of these duties and obligations the State must make judgments from time to time about the eligibility of people for certain benefits which are available. It must also pass judgment on where the balance should be struck between the private interest and the common good.

This is an area in which tremendous good can be done. In most cases, decisions are taken which are for the benefit of the community. If some decision is taken to confer benefit on the community, there are ways and means of ensuring that an individual is not harmed as a consequence. Because of a multitude of decisions and the immense complexity of ways and means of conferring or withholding benefit, it is possible that human error will result in perfection not being achieved at all times. It is clearly necessary to have some system which will reconcile the necessary exercise of governmental authority with the interests of the individual.

Another area where the parliamentary question, and political representations by politicians to Minister and Departments, may not serve the best interests of the individual, is related to matters which are the responsibility of State-sponsored bodies. Many Statutes of Oireachtas Éireann stop a Minister of State from interfering with the day-to-day workings of statutory bodies. It is undesirable when public money is involved that such bodies should be entirely free from any scrutiny. It is desirable that such organisations should also, if necessary, be subjected to the overall benign supervision which only an independent ombudsman system could provide.

We do not require—and it would be contrary to the public interest—to have an elaborate system of administrative justice. It would be undesirable that we should create a new empire, new institutions with a vast bureaucracy which would frustrate the efficient running of Government Departments, State agencies and local authorities. That is undesirable and can be avoided. We need a cheap, informal, expeditious way for people who feel aggrieved by some decisions to have their grievance examined by a person and an authority whose judgment would be respected as impartial. Being proud of the privilege of having been a public representative for 16 years, I can understand with sympathy the views expressed by Members of this House about the service they render to individuals, the services they render to the community in airing their grievances and in pressing them and having wrongs righted. That service will be required as much after we might institute the office of Ombudsman as it is required today. There are a number of countries— our nearest neighbour in particular— in which the system of administrative justice operates only when cases are brought to notice by Members of Parliament. That is a possibility which we should consider examining, but it might not be the most appropriate system to adopt here. There may be people desirous of maintaining total confidence about their own affairs and not wishing to share their affairs or their grievance or their fears with public representatives. They are entitled to have their confidence respected. It could be wrong to oblige them to seek the assistance of a politician in order to have their grievance aired.

On all sides of the House we have Members who are only too happy to render service to members of the public irrespective of political loyalty, outlook or profession of the people who approach them. In fact most Members of this House feel somewhat disgusted when persons approaching them believe that they have to profess political allegiance in order to get the service of the Member they approach.

I recall on one occasion in Dublin Corporation receiving a letter in an envelope addressed to myself but the letter inside the envelope was addressed to a colleague of an opposite party. That letter thanked him for using his good offices in making representations to obtain a house and pledged him, as in the past, undying political allegiance. I had read the letter by mistake before I realised it was intended for somebody else so I duly conveyed the letter to the man in question. He swopped a letter that he had received in identical terms which was intended for me. It is a pity that kind of thing happens, but it is not unusual. Other people have experienced it in various forms. It shows a weakness in the present system when people feel that rights are not available to them unless they go cap in hand to a political personality.

If we want to elevate the standard of public life, if we want people to realise that their entitlements are there irrespective of political patronage then we need a system which will enable people to resort to an impartial authority in order to have their grievances examined. The question arises as to what we can do.

The Department of the Public Service, which is the youngest of our Departmental offspring, has been extremely busy in many areas involving the restructuring and modernisation of the whole public service, endeavouring to make it more efficient and keep down numbers without impairing the service. The Department has also been engaged in activities which will help to give to public servants at all levels more satisfactory careers. But in spite of the tremendous workload which they have had, and it has been quite considerable, because apart from these areas they are also endeavouring to set up new institutions dealing with the separation of some Departments between policy making and administrative discharging functions, they have also done a considerable amount of work on the possibility of establishing a suitable system of administrative justice. It will be recalled that this matter was referred to previously in the Review Body's Report on the Public Service. It has also been studied by the Institute of Public Administration under the chairmanship of the then Chief Justice and now his Excellency, President Ó Dálaigh. Quite an amount of work has already been done in this area. In recent months my Department carried out an exhaustive examination of systems of administrative justice in a large number of countries. All this information is now available to us. But there are very few countries in which the whole administrative system is akin to ours. Several of them, like the French and other European systems, have written into their law for centuries past a special legal administrative system.

The Scandinavian countries are also very familiar with the system of ombudsman. There the operation of the public service is so open that any public file is open for inspection by any member of the public. We very properly would not wish public files to be seen by people who had no right of access to them or no cause to have access to them except to satisfy their own curiosity or to probe into other people's affairs. There is a need to have files in certain cases examined by independent persons. The truth is that the workload on Ministers to-day, who are in theory responsible for the decisions of their public servants, is so great that even when a grievance is brought to notice by way of a parliamentary question or by a Deputy's letter the Minister seldom has sufficient time personally to devote to as thorough an examination of a complaint as the complaint may in many cases deserve. All of this points to the great merit in the recommendation which Deputy O'Brien puts before us for consideration.

What do we do about it? The Government have given some thought to this matter and there are a number of possibilities. We could produce our own legislation and seek the approval of the Dáil and Seanad Éireann for that, but it would be preferable to have an all-party committee of the Oireachtas, an informal committee which would work fairly quickly to consider all aspects of the matter including the issues that have been raised conscientiously by Deputies on either side of the House.

A great deal has already been written on this matter. We have the Report of the Public Services Organisation Review Group, the work of the Institute of Public Administration, an amount of documentation available from the Department of the Public Service and we have the free and frank comments of Members of this House and of our friends in the media. If we had such a group from the Oireachtas we could discuss this matter impartially. I would be surprised if at the end of those deliberations there would not be a broad concensus in favour of instituting some institution of administrative justice which would convince everybody that where the public service acts it will not only act fairly but it will appear to be acting fairly. That is just as important because as convinced as I am, as we all are, that the public service invariably acts with complete integrity and invariably with immense efficiency, it is important that we convince everybody else of that. A system of administrative justice, call it ombudsman or whatever, would ensure that the public would be equally convinced and that would be a very good thing.

Mr. O'Brien

I should like to thank the House for the support given to this motion. I realise that Members have different points of view, but, generally, it is accepted that some form of control or ombudsman is required. The Minister has in mind to set up an all-party committee and this is probably the fairer way rather than bringing in a Bill. This does affect us all. As public representatives we are affected one way or another. It is important that one can judge from the machinery that exists within a State for checking administration, especially in dealings with individuals for their redress of grievances. This will show how democratic a State is. People feel at a loss if there is not somewhere to go to redress a grievance they have. An Administration not subject to scrutiny of its dealings with individuals is likely to become less effective and less sensitive to individuals.

We all know about the frustrations of people. We may ask a parliamentary question or write to the various Departments but that does not necessarily reveal the full story. For one reason or another facts can be hidden, not necessarily for any ulterior motive but just because various Departments may, through error or in-difference, do this. If we want people to have a sense of respect and trust in officialdom they must have redress to somebody who can have full access to all the information.

Some Deputies mentioned that they can look after the affairs of their constituency through the normal channels but I do not think any Deputy, no matter how well-meaning, can really and truly say that he can do an effective job. This is one of the reasons I moved this motion. Deputy Moore said that it was part of the policy and that it was time we did something about it but that is not the reason.

In my short time in public office I realised that there was a need for an ombudsman. From time to time I came up against barriers and, because of lack of information, I felt at a loss. But if I could refer a case to an ombudsman I would be fully satisfied in my own mind that the case would be truly looked at and that this would satisfy my constituent, the person who was aggrieved. This is important. It is also important that, as distinct from England, the aggrieved party may go directly to the ombudsman. He may not want to go to a political man because he may feel that the political person in his area does not represent him and, therefore, it is very important that he has access to the ombudsman.

Deputy Moore was not fully satisfied that there was such a need but I should like to quote him some figures that justify my belief that there is a need for such an office. A survey conducted in Dublin was quoted in Basil Chubb's book The Government and Politics of Ireland and there is reference to the citizen's expectation of treatment by Government officials. In Dublin 35 per cent of the people felt that they were not going to get, and did not expect, equal treatment, while the comparable figure for the UK was 7 per cent and in the United States it was 9 per cent. When these figures are compared there is certainly a great anomaly here. Obviously for one reason or another, there is a deep-seated suspicion that people who have a grievance will not get fair treatment. That does not necessarily mean they do not get fair treatment but if people feel they are not getting it they may be deterred from pursuing what they consider to be their rights. Another interesting figure is that in Dublin 17 per cent of the people expected to be ignored. When we compare this figure with the UK which had 5 per cent and in the United States 6 per cent there is obviously a big public relations job to be done here. The ombudsman could help in this area.

Deputy Crinion, in quoting my figure, mentioned that Sweden with a population of 7,000,000 and Denmark with 4,500,000 deal with approximately the same number of cases— 1,000 cases per year—and he said he dealt with that number in a few months. I do not accept this because if it was the case our administration would break down. These are day-to-day problems where people have to fill up forms, look for grants, apply for the children's allowance or seek a house but these are not complaints. These are jobs we do because over the years this custom has built up. I do not think it is the job of an ombudsman to fill a form for family allowance. Where there are genuine grievances they will have been pursued through public representatives before the ombudsman will be brought into play. I have no doubt about this.

Deputy Crinion mentioned that 1,000 cases a year is nothing but I consider it is 1,000 too much. Every grievance to the individual is a very serious one for that person and must be so treated. I do not see the ombudsman impinging on the rights of the Deputy in any way. The Deputy who does not keep in close contact with his constituents will pay the penalty and I think Members realise that. It is important that Deputies always keep in touch because only by keeping in touch are they aware of the day-to-day problems and thus initiate legislation to solve them.

What I am concerned about in moving this motion is that in regard to the grievances which arise, whether they are genuine or not, we cannot have full access to all the information. The files are not open to us. But it is imperative that the ombudsman have access to them. He will make a report both to the aggrieved party and to whichever Department, local authority or semi-State body with which the aggrieved party has a problem. I believe the passage of this motion through the House will improve the standard of democracy within our State. It will increase people's confidence in officials, giving them a greater awareness of and a greater trust and respect for them. The figures I read out highlight the problem we must tackle in this respect. There will always be a number of people who will distrust officials and who will be against the Establishment. That is part of life. But 35 per cent who do not expect equal treatment from officials is wrong. We have to eradicate that and it can be done only by the appointment of an ombudsman.

I thank the House for supporting my motion. I look forward to the all-party committee of this House to be set up by the Minister to examine the facts.

Question put and agreed to.