I move:
That it is expedient that the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Bill, 1976, which has lapsed and which before lapsing stood referred to the Standing Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills be revived and proceeded with at that stage.
I have available a short explanation which may be of benefit to the House. When the last Dáil was dissolved the Social Welfare (Consolidation) Bill, 1976, had passed its Second Stage and had been referred to the Standing Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills, but the Committee had not, in fact, met and the Bill lapsed. The purpose of this motion is to seek the agreement of Dáil Éireann to revive the Bill and to proceed with it at Committee Stage. If Deputies agree to this motion, the Seanad will be asked to pass a similar motion. The final step in the process of restoring the Bill to the Order Paper will be a further motion to that effect which must also be agreed by both Houses. When all of these motions have been passed the Bill will stand referred to the new Standing Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills, which will shortly be established.
For the benefit of the new Deputies in the House I will briefly sketch the outline of this Bill. Its main purpose is to repeal all existing provisions of the statute law relating to social welfare and to re-enact them in a single measure. It, therefore, embraces the provisions of more than 60 Acts from the Old Age Pensions Act, 1908 right through to the Social Welfare (No. 2) Act, 1976. It also includes the provisions of subsidiary legislation—such as statutory instruments and statutory rules and orders—where such legislation expressly amends or modifies the statute law.
The Bill itself is a very substantial piece of legislation and contains some 311 sections and runs to more than 200 pages of print. It includes the legal provisions covering all the schemes administered by the Department of Social Welfare on both the social insurance and social assistance sides. It also, of course, covers the many ancillary provisions which relate to the administration of these schemes such as the decisions and appeals machinery, financing, the arrangements for legal proceedings and so on.
There is one essential aspect of a Consolidation Bill and it is that the Bill cannot provide for any change in the law as it stands. The former Attorney General has issued the necessary certificate, under Standing Orders, to the effect that this Bill is purely a consolidating measure and as such does not in any way alter the existing law.
The Bill was introduced because of repeated requests from interested bodies in the public and private sectors who had to have recourse to social welfare legislation. Because of the large number of Acts and the numerous changes over the years in these Acts, this legislation had become exceedingly complex and difficult to interpret. Similarly, many Members of both Houses of the Oireachtas had called for consolidation of this widely referred to body of legislation and had asked for a more manageable piece of legislation with which to work. The present Bill does, I think, meet all of these very legitimate requests and it will, I hope, provide all interested individuals with a readable and workable legislative framework.
Finally, I should like to mention that the new Bill will, when enacted, be made available in a loose-leaf form which will be capable of being updated after the passage of subsequent legislation. This was done in the case of the Income Tax Acts and it ensures that the process of consolidation becomes a continuing one and obviates the necessity for any further consolidation measures.
