Deputy Howlin has eight minutes.
Private Members' Business. - Ethics in Government: Motion (Resumed).
The following motion was moved by Deputy G. Mitchell on Tuesday, 12 November 1991:
That Dáil Éireann being of the opinion that it is necessary that there be an explicit, effective and well understood code of ethics governing elected politicians, as well as State board members and senior officials of Government Departments and State companies, and that it is necessary to create a greater openness and accountability in public affairs through freedom of information therefore resolves:
(1) to establish a Parliamentary Ethics Commission (hereinafter referred to as `the Commission') consisting of the Ombudsman, the Comptroller and Auditor General and a Judge of the High Court to perform, inter alia, the functions set out hereunder;
(2) to request the Commission to draw up, after consultation with the Committees for Procedure and Privileges of the Dáil and Seanad, a code of ethics governing MEPs, Dáil Deputies, Senators and Councillors and to make provision for the subsequent enforcement of such a code;
(3) that the code referred to in (2) above will deal, inter alia, with relationships with outside bodies, disclosure, artificial transactions and abstention from involvement where conflict of interest may arise;
(4) to request the Commission to draw up a detailed provision for a register of politicians' interests, on the basis that:—
(a) in the case of Ministers and Chairmen of Parliamentary Committees, the material in the register would be available for public inspection as of the time of their appointment and for five years after their appointment has ceased,
(b) in the case of other politicians, the material would be available at all times for inspection by the Commission, and would be published in any case where the Commission felt this was necessary in the light of its investigation of allegations made to it of breaches of the code of ethics;
(5) that the Government should draw up a scheme for more substantial State funding of political parties (excluding those who support violence directly or indirectly), on a basis of a ratio of the parties' proportionate electoral strengths to the size of Gross National Product, to cover separately ongoing expenses and election campaigns, so as to reduce the reliance of parties on private donations;
(6) that the Commission be requested to make recommendations to Dáil Éireann as to a maximum contribution that might be made by any one individual, organisation, company or group of associated companies to any one political party or to any one individual candidate, and as to a maximum amount that might be spent in an individual election campaign by either a party or an individual candidate;
(7) that all political parties and candidates keep accounts of income and expenditure, and that these be lodged for inspection with the Commission so that the Commission may determine whether there have been any breaches of the provisions outlined above;
(8) that a Freedom of Information Act be enacted at the earliest opportunity so that every Irish citizen shall have free access to official documents, including tapes and database, as a normal democratic right of citizenship, subject only to the restrictions which may be necessary having regard to:
(a) the security of the State or its relations with a foreign State or international organisations,
(b) the central finance policy, monetary policy, or foreign exchange policy of the State,
(c) the inspection control or other supervisory activities of a public authority,
(d) the interest of presenting or prosecuting a crime,
(e) the public economic interest,
(f) the protection of the personal integrity or economic conditions of private citizens and
(g) the protection of the environment;
(9) that where a Minister, or public body, claims a restriction of access, under paragraph 8 above, a citizen shall have right of appeal to the Parliamentary Ethics Commission whose ruling shall be binding on all concerned, subject only to the courts of the land.
—Deputy Gay Mitchell.
Debate resumed on amendment No. 1.
To delete all words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:
"notes the Government's determination as set out in the recently published Programme for Government to ensure the highest standards of ethical behaviour in the conduct of all State and commercial business dealings and fully supports the specific proposals set out in that Programme including:—
—the introduction of a register of material interests for all members of the Oireachtas as from September, 1992;
—the introduction of regulations which will include provisions to apply to State bodies, to regulate business standards, including provisions that:
—Board members and any persons involved in the management and/or control of such companies will be required to disclose any direct or indirect personal interest in the company's business,
—there will be severe penalties for non-disclosure, including forfeiture and recovery of all clandestine profits or personal gains made at the company's expense;
—the requirement that persons proposed for appointment to Boards of all State agencies and companies should make a declaration of any interests relevant to their membership of such bodies;
—the introduction of an appropriate code of conduct for employees in each State company, together with an adequate system of internal audit;
—the putting in place of firm procedures to apply to State companies the principle of competitive tendering required under current Government contract procedures in the civil service, these procedures to apply to both works contracts and to supply and service contracts;
—the taking of steps to ensure the better regulation of those offering investment services;
and further notes that the question of freedom of information is a matter which the Government intend to examine carefully with a view to the framing of appropriate legislation.—
—(Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach.)
I will try to maintain the tranquility established by the previous speaker but I cannot guarantee that I will succeed in doing that. We are dealing with a Fine Gael motion on ethics and standards in public life and the need to have some degree of transparency and regulation into the financial affairs of Members of this House and others so that we can restore again the confidence that has been sorely eroded in recent months and years, a confidence that the people of Ireland want vested very firmly in their elected representatives. Last night I said that I approached this motion almost with a sense of deja vue. We have sought in the Labour Party for almost two years to incorporate either into the rules of this House or by way of legislation a basic code of ethics for those involved in public life in Ireland and the history of that is now known to everybody. In February 1989 the Leader of the Labour Party wrote to the Ceann Comhairle outlining proposals for a code of ethics and for a register of Members' interests. I as Labour Party Whip followed up on 19 October by tabling a comprehensive motion incorporating those proposals before the Committee on Procedure and Privileges. Unfortunately, the debate that took place on those motions in 1989 and 1990 was less than edifying because it became abundantly clear to me very quickly that the two major parties in this House, both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, had no intention of allowing that particular code of conduct and that declaration of Members' interests to be enshrined into the rules of this House. They were first referred to the Whips for consideration, until I raised it again when it was referred to the parliamentary parties for consideration. After months and months no progress whatsoever was made to have those basic principles enshrined in the rules of the House.
I am stoical by disposition and I decided to try another avenue and the Parliamentary Labour Party authorised me to produce a Private Members' Bill, which was published in my name on 26 February 1991. This Bill was the next step in the development of the proposals we put before the Committee on Procedure and Privileges. It had three fundamental principles: gifts over £200 to office holders would be public property; there would be a register of Members' interests; there would be a transparency in the funding of political parties so that people who make substantial and sizeable contributions to political parties would be known to the public and so that any potential conflict of interest could be seen and diverted. Unfortunately, when that Bill came before the House in May of this year, it was voted down by the combination of the Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats parties. I said last night that the Progressive Democrats privately lauded the Bill and wanted in their hearts to support it, but unfortunately they had finished one macho deed that day in demanding an inquiry into the beef industry and I think they are precluded from performing on a macho basis more than twice in the same day. Unfortunately, our Bill was defeated.
Tonight we are faced with another attempt. I do not regard it as perfect, indeed it is quite flawed in many ways, but it still incorporates a fundamental principle that there be transparency in the way we do our business in this House. For that reason the Labour Party will be supporting the motion tabled by Fine Gael when we vote at 8.30 p.m. There are matters of fundamental principle and it always goads me when people object because they do not like the phraseology, the structure or the sloppy wording. If the principle is right, let us work on the principle and get the drafting right later on. I said also that I was amused because when we produced rules of the House at the Committee on Procedure and Privileges we were told they were inappropriate and they were kicked to touch; and when we produced a Bill we were told that legislation was not the proper way to do it but that it should be done by way of rules of the House. That underscores clearly to me that there is a fundamental unwillingness, particularly from the Government side of this House, to have this sort of transparency and accountability that most civilised Parliaments have as a matter of course.
In the couple of minutes remaining I wish to deal with one issue which was raised initially by the former Minister for Finance when discussing the Labour Party Bill and which was addressed again last night by the mover of the motion, and the Minister of State and Government Chief Whip, the funding of political parties. I want to put it on record that the Labour Party have always had total transparency in relation to our funding as we publish annual accounts and all donations are a matter of public record. Hopefully other parties will do likewise. However, I believe the time has come when we have to look at the proper funding of political parties. The Labour Party are not averse to the suggestion put forward by the mover of the resolution last night. I think this matter should be considered seriously by an all party committee of this House so that we can get away from the underfunding of political parties and of public life, where lobby groups come in here with far more research backup and authority behind them than the legislators who are enacting the legislation in this House. For that reason I would be dismayed if the tone of the Minister of State's remarks were to be put into practice.
The Minister of State suggested that we had to uncouple the funding of political parties from the issues of ethics because the Government were going to move forward with great gusto on the issue of ethics. Having buried the issue for two-and-a-half years, there is a certain nerve and cheek attached to that assertion. It was never more opportune to bring back public confidence in this House. The erosion of public confidence that I alluded to in my speech in May has gone on with gusto and the happenings of the past number of months have damaged to a greater extent the public confidence in this House. We need to bring back the authority of this House, the accountability of Government and the responsibility of every Member of this House. I hope that all parties will accept these fundamental principles when they are put to the vote at 8.30 p.m. this evening.
With the permission of the Chair I wish to share my time with Deputies Fitzpatrick and Dennehy.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
I could not help thinking when listening to the final words of Deputy Howlin about confidence in this House being undermined that no one is doing more to undermine it than ourselves. I really think we are giving it a terrible blow. I am not talking about this side of the House——
The Deputy cannot sweep things under the carpet.
——but all sides of the House. The Opposition are being politically opportunist and are behaving in a somewhat reckless manner in many instances.
I commend my colleague Deputy G. Mitchell — we both serve together in the constituency — who is an honest, hardworking fulltime politician like myself. We know what it is like to be a fulltime politician: it is very difficult indeed, because of the fact we have to pay the overheads for running our constituency out of our Dáil allowances and that certainly does not make it easy.
I think that our amendment to the motion is entitled to be supported, first of all because it is the Government's responsibility to govern and to introduce the legislation. It has already been said that in September 1992 a register will be set up in the Library showing the interests of Members. That register will be designed along the lines set out by Members of the House at meetings of the Committee on Procedure and Privileges. If other people feel they can police themselves then I do not understand why we should not also, until such time as it can be shown that all the parties are in cahoots with each other in trying to defraud the public or otherwise.
The standards in this House are very high. It is important to note that people outside the House have very little realisation of the financial sacrifices made by many full-time Members. It is a big help if one has another profession to fall back on. I should resent very much an outside commission deciding for this House — this is our Legislature, we have the ultimate responsibility and we are trusted by the public——
We are not.
——every time we go before them to behave in a manner which is in accordance with their expectations. The public have recourse at subsequent elections to take action against anyone who goes against that and infringes on the trust that has been placed in us. I think I can say, from fairly lengthy experience, that people are very quick to know if a Member is behaving in a manner of which they disapprove, and that will certainly reflect in the subsequent election results for that person.
I should like other people to subject themselves to the same kind of stringent examination that is being encouraged outside the House. For example, Deputy Mitchell last night referred to the news media as one certain group. RTE, for example, are a huge organisation with millions of pounds to spare. It would be interesting to know what responsibility they have towards making sure that there is no vested interests among their employees or that people who have contracts with them do not get favourable treatment or other benefits. That is possible. What about the people who make films and sell them to the station? How much do the station pay for those films? Is it the going rate? Who examines those matters? There are many questions that could be asked.
I consider it important that journalists who write for certain papers should have no vested interest in supporting a particular line, perhaps because of outside vested interests that would like them to take a certain line on issues. In that regard, I am not necessarily talking about outside this country, I am talking about outside their own profession.
There are many aspects of society that could stand up to a better scrutiny than is operated at present. For years and years Members in the House have advocated the establishment of a press council. We still do not have a press council. Why do the press not set up a press council to monitor themselves? They have talked about it. I remember that the late Vivion de Valera used to talk about an allocation of £10 a year being made in the supplementary budget to help to set up a press council. I think that that is an organisation that is very much needed. All of the time we hear complaints about the size of libel awards, and many of those actions might not arise if there were a press council.
Members here have the Committee on Procedure and Privileges. At least if someone in the House gets out of line or says something that is defamatory of somebody outside of the House he or she can be brought up and censured. It is a very serious offence for anyone to be censured by his or her own peers.
It does not happen.
This has happened.
They have not been meeting for months.
I want to state my support for the State funding of political parties. Today the cost of running elections has become completely obscene.
Hear, hear.
I am glad the Government are considering this matter and I am glad there is agreement around the House on it. I know that the public perception may well be that we in the House are feathering our own nests, that we will pay for ourselves to run for re-election with their money and that there will be all kinds of arguments of that nature put forward. However, we should stand together and explain that this move is in their interests because we do not want to have to be dependent on companies giving huge donations.
I personally should like to have a limit on spending in different individual constituencies by individual candidates but, unfortunately, it is very difficult to do that and it is something that could not be policed very effectively.
They do it in Britain.
How would that be done? If someone decided to employ a certain number of people to go out and campaign for him or her or to do something similar and then pay them cash, how would that be found out? How would it be stopped? That is a little too much to expect. As a full-time politician, I am very supportive of limiting the amount of money that can be spent by each candidate. I think that it would be great if that could be done: we would know exactly where we stood and we could actually raise money to reach that target figure in advance of elections, if that were possible. Deputy Mitchell and myself agreed at the local elections that we would not put up posters. At least we cut our expenditure in that way and I think that many people were also pleased in that the environment did not suffer from too many posters, which people tend to complain about. There are certain other areas in which we could make changes, but I am fully supportive of the State funding political parties.
Again, the question of maximum contributions is one that is difficult. If people want to give to maintain the democratic process — and it is something that it is important to maintain — let them, but let political parties be not so dependent on gigantic contributions that they might be accused of becoming indebted to a person or organisation in the sense of perhaps granting favours in the future. In all my political life I have always told people that I cannot get them anything to which they are not entitled, all that I can do is to speed up the process by which they do get that to which they are entitled. That is what they are here for. We are the buffers between the people and the bureaucrats. When people are not getting their entitlements we can go straight in to find out why not. That is our main function, representing the people.
I note that a Freedom of Information Bill is being examined at the moment. In fact, we state here in our amendment to the motion "and further notes that the question of freedom of information is a matter which the Government intend to examine carefully with a view to the framing of appropriate legislation". That has to be done very carefully.
It is a good idea that the House should have the kind of debate that we are having. It is good that people know that all parties would welcome a situation in which the interests of public representatives can be examined. Local authorities have a register of interests; I am actually on that register myself as a member of Dublin Corporation.
I have agreed to share my time, so I should like to conclude by saying that a register of Members' material interests will be established from September 1992 and available in the Oireachtas Library. In fact, I think this provision goes further in the case of backbenchers than the proposals in this motion. "The details of the operation of this register will be worked out in the Committee on Procedure and Privileges and any comments which Deputies may have on this matter might more profitably be directed at the Committee", and there I quote from the speech made here by the Minister of State last night. We should be happy enough to accept that and to see where it goes from there, but let us not be seen to be foolish by putting ourselves completely under the authority of other people. This Legislature is the ultimate authority in this country but, the people are our judges when we go before them. I always contend that if everybody who is employed had to go before the people every few years on the basis of their performance perhaps we would move at an even faster pace and our country could be wealthier than Switzerland.
I should like to thank my colleagues for agreeing to share their time with me. I will not detain the House very long. I was interested to hear Deputy Howlin say that he was a stoic in these matters. Perhaps his stoicism will be tested this evening at 8.30 p.m.
I am an optimist as well.
I do not have fundamental complaints with this motion although I might argue some of its detail. There appears to be a feeling among Members of this House that there must be seen to be transparency of Members' actions, backgrounds and business, professional or whatever. As a public representative I contend the public have a right to know details of my financial connections. As Deputy Briscoe said, there is in Dublin Corporation a register the public are quite free to examine during office hours when they can check on my finances, interests and so on. However, I can assure the public that, like most Members, it is my overdraft which is my main cause of concern.
Perhaps if all Members' overdrafts were totted up it would make the national deficit appear insignificant.
It is the concern of my bank manager more than the Minister for Finance.
There is one point I want to make this evening, which is that increasingly political thought in this country is moulded by people outside this Chamber. Deputy Howlin spoke of different pressure groups lobbying for their interests. Most organs of the media have a range of commentators and reporters dealing with different aspects of political, social and economic life. Such people have a large input in the shaping of thought in this Chamber. Yet they are comprised mainly of a shadowy body of men and women, answerable to nobody, with the exception of the editors of their papers and circulation managers. Perhaps Deputy Gay Mitchell would reflect further on this matter. If we are to draw up a register of interests of Deputies and Senators there should be drawn up also a register of interests of commentators, people who comment on our actions here, many of whom come from diverse political, economic, social and religious backgrounds. For example, I should like to know the background of the leader writer of the main daily papers I read. Such knowledge would help me form an opinion of his or her background and interest and allow me form an opinion as to whether such commentary was written from a value-free position. Unfortunately, most organs of the media do not have this. The late John Healy, who at the beginning of each election campaign nailed his colours to the mast — and not always to the Fianna Fáil mast — at least declared an interest at the beginning of an election campaign. I contend that political reporters, social commentators and so on should declare an interest; we should know their backgrounds. Possibly when the Government book of interests is opened in the Dáil Library Members can peruse it as well to ascertain the background of people who contribute to the moulding of Irish political thought.
From a reading of the motion and the amendment tabled, one ascertains that the difference between them is whether this House controls the activities of its Members or whether such control should be handed over to an outside body. For example, paragraph (1) of the motion calls for the establishment of a parliamentary ethics commission. It is that which would present me with greatest difficulty in that nearly all of the other issues addressed are to be the subject of programming ensuing months. In that way it could be contended that the tabling of this motion was an attempt to jump the queue somewhat. We need to examine this question of the appointment of a parliamentary ethics commission to control our affairs, handling the declaration of interests or the various other issues addressed in this motion. I see the establishment of a parliamentary ethics commission as being in direct conflict with the Constitution — the Minister of State may have referred to that fact last evening — in that the Constitution is very clear and precise in stating that Members of this House should control their activities and not hand over such control to any outside body. I say that in the context of what is being addressed in this motion. I am not a legal person but I would perceive a direct clash with our Constitution in that regard.
I predict that the public will identify very quickly with the basic issue of the cost involved, the cost of such a commission, in that it is specified that its members should be comprised of various people outside this House. It could be contended that such people are being paid already to carry out their duties and that there would not be any extra remuneration involved. I would totally disagree with any such suggestion because all such bodies established tend to expand. If anybody needed evidence of that fact they need look only at the Office of the Ombudsman where there are demands annually for more finance, more staff, more expenditure of public finance for that Office. We must remember that public finances are comprised of taxpayers' money; it is taxpayers money we are talking about and not some pot of gold we dig up.
I could foresee this proposal growing to the point of it becoming a quango, what Deputy John Bruton described in the course of his contribution as a quango. Indeed, he declared in the early eighties his intention to remove these overlapping layers of bureaucracy, quangos, saying he would eliminate them all. Now there appears to be a suggestion for the establishment of yet another. Bearing in mind the cost to the public purse, I disagree totally with the establishment of an outside body for a fundamental reason, that it calls into question the integrity of the Members of this House.
I know there are groups of people — almost invariably peer groups — who monitor the rules, regulations and actions of various bodies. For example, we do not hear the Judiciary or the legal profession suggest that we should establish a group of politicians to oversee their work. That might ring some bells in some people's minds. There is no such suggestion, because the legal profession trust themselves. They would tend to say: how dare anybody else question our integrity; how dare they suggest that we be capable of the type of misdemeanours often placed at politicians' doors; we will be controlled, governed and regulated by a peer group. For that reason I would object to handing over control of our activities to any outside body. That is the fundamental difference between the motion and the amendment. The amendment goes far beyond the terms of the motion in introducing issues needing to be addressed at this time.
Where does it introduce anything to do with that?
I am not as experienced in such matters as Deputy Garret FitzGerald. I do not know when to interrupt or heckle, but I will keep a vigilant watch and endeavour to find out.
Two previous speakers have referred to the funding of political bodies and paying for elections. I would have to support that kind of thinking on the basis that there is not equality of opportunity. We are aghast at the amount of money spent during the American presidential election campaigns. In my constituency I could be running against a millionaire businessman. How could I compete on an equal footing? I am a professional politician with no source of income other than my salary from this House. I do not go on lecture tours, publish books or run a business. A long look is needed at the financing of political parties. This would not solve all difficulties but it would ease some of the public disquiet.
There has been a clamour for public inquiries on various issues. I have costed a few of the inquiries which took place three or four years ago. The lowest cost was approximately £1 million. It is easy to call for this type of thing but the public are entitled to ask if it is necessary to expend money in this way.
I urge that the amendment be accepted. Deputy FitzGerald asked why these other items in the amendment should be included at this stage. Many of these matters are related. It is significant that the proposals in the amendment are published prior to the putting down of the amendment. The introduction of the register of material interests is proposed for September 1992. I already have to declare interests at local government level and I do not see why anybody should be excluded. It is good discipline. A freedom of information Bill is also related. There is no point in having some form of control which the public cannot check.
I am not as familiar as some other speakers with the workings of the Committee on Procedure and Privileges. I have had to sit in on a few meetings of the Committee on Procedure and Privileges and I have seen open and frank discussion and a great effort by Members to examine each issue. They are capable of looking at other issues and coming up with guidelines. I have total trust in them.
I have covered three basic points: the questioning of the integrity of Members of this House, cost and the Constitution itself. There is one other proposal included in the motion which I believe could not be implemented. I refer to the code of ethics governing MEPs. Can we as a State Legislature restrict our MEPs in ways that others are not? I am not sure exactly what is meant. A code of ethics for MEPs is drawn up at the European Parliament and we should not attempt to overlap.
I urge the adoption of the amendment because of the extra areas it covers. I worry about the kneejerk reaction to public disquiet which led, for instance, to legislation requiring the muzzling of dogs. There is a danger that Deputies Bruton and Mitchell could fall into the same kind of trap in this regard. The amendment provides for internal control and a declaration of interests but excludes an ethics commission outside this House. On last weeks "Late Late Show" it took about a quarter of an hour to drag out the interests of a Member of farming. It can be difficult to elicit such information but I am sure these difficulties can be surmounted. It is right that the public should know these things upfront and not through a television programme.
I work closely with Deputy Gay Mitchell on the Committee of Public Accounts. He is a totally committed and very fair person. On examination of the amendment he will see that it goes far beyond what he has been calling for and I strongly urge its acceptance.
I wish to share my time with Deputy Mac Giolla.
Is that satisfactory? Agreed.
The Workers' Party will be supporting this motion to establish a parliamentary ethics commission. We are not entirely happy with every detail of the motion. Some aspects of Fine Gael's proposals we disagree with — for example, the proposed basis for the funding of political parties. We disagree with some of the proposed limitations on access to information and we question the kind of commission which Fine Gael propose to establish and how it would interrelate with democratically-elected bodies. But we support the principle that mechanisms must be established which ensure the highest standards of honesty and integrity in public and business life. We need to provide for greater openness and accountability in public affairs and greater public access to information.
We welcome this debate and the motion which has brought it about. It is a debate which is intended to turn our attention to the solutions to some of the problems which public life in this State has recently experienced. It is a debate which is very much in the context of the political debate in this House and in the country generally over the past few weeks and it relates very much to the other item on the Dáil agenda today, the appointment of new Government Ministers. Over the past number of weeks one word has dominated public debate.—"confidence". Confidence was lost in senior executives of a State company and they were forced to resign. Confidence was lost in the chairpersons of certain State bodies and they were asked to step aside. This House witnessed a most acrimonious debate of no confidence in the Government. Fianna Fáil spent the last week deciding whether or not they had confidence in their leader. Today this House is being asked to vote confidence in new Ministers and, by extension, in the Government.
To date only Members of this House or those involved in the companies concerned have been allowed to express their confidence or lack of it in the various people concerned. However, there is a wider issue of confidence which has not yet been allowed to be expressed and which the motion before us raises in a very direct way, that is, the question of public confidence. Over the past number of weeks public confidence in the Government has been reduced to an alltime low. Public confidence in business has been eroded. This has been confirmed by the findings of a recent opinion poll which showed that three quarters of those questioned believed that standards in politics and business life were falling. Public confidence in politics and democracy has also been eroded. There has always been a latent attitude that politician's are on the make and are only in it for what they can get out of it. That view has been strongly reinforced by the events and revelations of the past few weeks.
Some Members of this House have argued — and Deputy Briscoe subscribed to this view in his contribution — that those of us who have raised questions about the conduct of business, behaviour and accountability of some politicians should have remained silent. It has been suggested that the erosion of public confidence is the fault of the Opposition TDs who raised the questions or the media who reported the events rather than those who have been in Government and positions of responsibility and whose answers were either non-existent, evasive or incomplete. Is it being suggested that we should have remained silent? Are we being told that having been supplied with information we should have buried it and not done our duty by insisting on accountability from Government Ministers?
The events of the past number of weeks have certainly contributed enormously to the erosion of public confidence in Government, politicians and business. How much worse would it be in the long run and how much more damaging would it be to public and business life if we all lived a lie, if Opposition politicians remained silent and journalists printed only the good news supplied by the Government press office? Surely that would ultimately lead to an even greater erosion of public confidence and greater cynicism.
The debate tonight is about how to restore public confidence in politics and business life. We need to do two things to restore public confidence. First, we need a cleansing of the body politic and, second, we need to put in place new relevant politics and new mechanisms to make sure that such events can never happen again.
I am disgusted with what has passed for politics in this State in the recent past. I belong to what I call the Donogh O'Malley generation, the generation which grew up in the Ireland of the sixties and early seventies, the first and only generation for whom emigration was not an imperative and who could hope to make a living and a home in our own country. Many of us were lifted out of poverty by free education. We had hope. It was a time of change. We glimpsed a wider world through the new medium of television. Some of us were influenced by the civil rights and anti-war movements. Some of us questioned the versions of history which we had been taught and we wondered if patriotism was not better served by working for our people than by dying for our country.
When we now see this country sliding back into economic depression we wonder if our children will have to follow the sad stampede to Maryfield, Virginia, and the humiliating lottery for a chance to make a living in the same cities which once gave refuge to the victims of the famine. What has become of our independence and pride? Our island is rich in resources — the sea, good land, relatively unpolluted air and large deposits of mineral resources. By European standards we have a relatively under-populated land. Our people are talented and excel in almost every endeavour. Our films can win Oscars, our young musicians can excite the world and our emigrants can make good in every land. Yet after 70 years of independent statehood our Government are still not capable of harnessing the talent and wealth of this land to provide for our small population.
Unfortunately, it is not just a question of competence or policies. There is a crisis of confidence in this country because there is a strong suspicion of corruption. It is sad that there should have to be a motion before this House to establish an independent commission to force honesty on politics and business and reverse the widespread public perception that politicans are dodgy and business people corrupt.
The fact is that the vast majority of politicians, whatever their political persuasion, have the highest integrity and are motivated by a wish to serve the public. So too are the vast majority of public servants and business people. What is the problem? The problem first is that some have abused their positions. The problem too is that we have inherited a political and business culture in this State which has rewarded sharp practice, encouraged social crimes such as tax evasion and regarded political rogues more like favourite characters in a soap opera than people who hold some of the highest offices in the land.
The circumatances which have led to the tabling of this motion are part of the cleansing of Irish politics. This country must rid itself of the mohair suits and what they stand for. The mohair-suited generation of politicians took over the running of this country from the founding fathers of the State. The mohair suits behave as if they had inherited not the Government but the ownership of the country. To the public they proclaimed the great national aims, while in private they pursued their own aim of making as much money as quickly and as effortlessly as possible. They substituted exploitation of the country for service of the people. They substituted a parasitic style of business for productive enterprise. They cultivated a culture of cynicism. They were cynical about the people and the people have become cynical about politics.
They have turned the country into a chancer's paradise. Property speculators rip off the taxpayer and the family trying to buy a home. Tax evasion has become something to be proud of, rather than a cause for shame. While public services are starved of resources, a whole new profession of tax consultants and accountants have grown up to help wealthy people avoid making a fair contribution to the well-being of all.
For years we have been told that it is necessary to create a climate for enterprise but the climate which has been created encourages not enterprise but speculation, not wealth distribution but tax avoidance and not prosperity but poverty. It bloated the greed of the few and inevitably it had to get sick.
The scandals of the past few months have not been an aberration. They are the result of 30 years of selfish greed and business gluttony. The public want an end to it. The people are scandalised by the two-tier society which recent events have exposed. Every day there is new evidence that in Ireland there is one law for the rich and another for the poor. The vast majority of people of this State are simply trying to get by. Nearly 300,000 people have no jobs, that many again have emigrated over the past decade and some of those are now rightly demanding a political say, a vote, in how the country is run. Those who have jobs worry about whether they will still have them five years from now. What will be the economic consequences of European union? Will our children have any future on this island or will it become an offshore golf course for the rich and powerful of the new European super state?
People look to politicians for leadership for government and for solutions. What they are finding is a Government not selflessly addressing the nation's problems but hand in glove with some of the greediest elements in our society. We now need new publicly acceptable standards of ethics in public life and that is why I welcome the motion before us. I should like to deal with some of the details in that motion.
There should be no question but that a register of interests for Deputies and Senators is necessary. I welcome the fact that there is a promise — admittedly rather vague — contained in the agreed Programme for Government which refers to a register of all Members' material interests. The question arises as to whether that covers the interests of relatives, or does it cover beneficial interests which Members may have but which may be disguised by some means, mezzanine companies, or some of the other buzz terms that have come into our vocabulary in recent times?
There should, in my view, be a requirement also that Members declare in whose interest they are acting in this House. Something which emerged in the United Kingdom arising from the establishment of a register of interests in the House of Commons was that many MPs were acting as consultants or advisers for in some cases commercial interests. In fact it was shown that 170 out of the 650 MPs had on a paid basis some kind of brief for an outside interest. It would be interesting to know if any Members of this House — quite apart from their own personal interests and their own material interests and the way in which they may conflict with their role as legislators — are consultants or advisers on a paid basis to commercial interests or to lobbies which may wish to influence the passage of legislation in this House. I would like to quote a comment made by a Labour MP in the United Kingdom in relation to this matter when he raised a question about it in the House of Commons. He asked was it in order for a member of the House to prostitute himself and to try to sell for personal gain specialist knowledge obtained through his membership of the House and through dealings with Ministers. That is a matter that needs to be addressed in the context of any register of interests which is established in this State.
The second issue which has arisen concerns the funding of political parties. Unlike the Minister of State, who spoke yesterday, I believe the issue of the funding of political parties is directly related to the issue of ethics in public life and directly related to many of the issues which have been under debate for some time. Much of the public concern arises from the corporate funding of political parties and from the size of contributions which are made to them. There is an understandable belief that if a company or a private individual gives a large donation to a political party or to an individual politician they will expect something in return for it. That is an understandable belief in the kind of political culture that has been encouraged and developed in Ireland.
Political parties are an essential component of our democratic system. We need to recall the degree of influence which political parties have on our democratic system. Most of the Members of this House were selected initially by political parties. Political parties operate the short-listing system for membership of this House. For example, membership of the Seanad is heavily dependent on political affiliation. Local government and the appointments to many bodies, whether State bodies or bodies appointed at local level, is often on the basis of political affiliation. The funding of political parties is a very crucial issue and clearly there are problems in relation to the funding of those parties. At least three of the political parties in this House have publicly declared that they have serious financial problems. Political parties, like any organisation, are essentially voluntary bodies made up of people who would join voluntarily and give a limited amount of their free time to advancing a particular political point of view.
I am amazed at the degree of horror which was expressed by the chairman of the Progressive Democrats when the suggestion was made about the State funding of political parties. I might add that the chairman of the Progressive Democrats seems to get much more attention in the public airwaves than any Member of this House. I sometimes wonder what the Taoiseach would say if an officer of The Workers' Party, for example, who was not a Member of this House was to get anything remotely like the amount of coverage he gets. Leaving that aside, he suggested there was something inherently wrong with political parties, which are such an essential component of our democratic system, being funded through the State. Yet, if we look at it, there are a whole range of bodies which benefit from State funding. Trade unions benefit from State funding for the purposes of amalgamation and they benefit from State funding for the purpose of training for their members and the Irish Management Institute and managerial bodies benefit from State funding for training and for various other purposes. Many voluntary organisations benefit from State funding through the National Lottery. What is so outrageous with the idea of State funding for political parties to enable them to do the work and to contribute to the political and democratic fabric of our society?
There is, however, another side to that coin to which Deputy Howlin referred. That is, if there is to be State funding for political parties then parties must be prepared to declare the contributions which are made to them by individuals or by corporate bodies. There should be a requirement that contributions over a certain limit be declared publicly and the public should know from whom political parties are getting large contributions. There should be some limitation put on spending and on the promotion both by political parties and by individual politicians at election time. The term "a level playing pitch" has been used in this House in relation to many matters, but political activity is not a level playing pitch. Clearly, the two largest parties in this House are at a financial advantage at election time and are able to have a large number of newspaper advertisements. Individual politicians spend very large sums of money in order to get elected. I know of one case in the recent local elections where an individual candidate is reputed to have spent £25,000 in an election campaign to win election to a county council.
Reputed.
I saw a fair amount of evidence of it.
That is a word that is being used frequently.
Has the Minister something to hide?
Very few local election candidates would have been able to keep two vans permanently on the road for the entire duration of the local election campaign advertising on his behalf, or would have mobilised the number of canvassers, meals, entertainment and so on during the three weeks of the election campaign. I do not think the sum of £25,000 is an inaccurate estimate. The point I am making is that there should be a limit on spending in elections by individual politicians and by political parties because otherwise we will get into the United States situation where the right to be elected will be conferred on those who can spend the most money or who can get ascess to the most money. This brings us back to the quagmire in which we have been over the last period.
I am sharing my time with Deputy Mac Giolla. I want to make a final point which needs to be looked at. To some extent I share the concerns that have been expressed by Members of the Government side about the idea of having to establish another quango to deal with the question of accountability of politicians. Many of the difficulties we have in this area and which we have had in the recent past are due to failure of the Dáil to be able to address our problems. This House, as presently structured and as the rules of this House allow us, is not to make Ministers accountable.
Many of the questions raised about business dealings and so on have not been answered. As long ago as last February I attempted to ask the Minister for Education questions about Carysfort and those questions eventually ended up being asked on the broadcasting air waves. There is an urgent need to reform the procedures of the House so that we can have proper accountability. The kind of question time we have, where the pursuit of questions which may be of major public interest is limited to at most three or four minutes of a highly structured old fashioned style of debating and questioning needs to be reformed. We need a more open, more direct style of accountability in this House by Ministers to the Members. If we got that, if we got answers to our queries, the necessity for establishing inquiries would be eliminated. If we got accountability in this House on behalf of the public many of the problems that have now arisen might not have arisen in the way which they arose.
Anois, An Teachta Mac Giolla. Tá ocht nóiméad agat.
I will not go into the recent scandals. The need for an ethics commission was there well before that. I support the motion rather than the amendment because there is a commission. There is not much point in passing a motion here unless there is some monitoring system to ensure that what we are proposing is put into effect. I am afraid that the Taoiseach's amendment does not do anything in that regard. It is simply a pious platitude without any way of ensuring that what is suggested will be done.
Throughout the eighties in particular there has been greatly increased pressure on public servants and on politicians by speculators and developers because there is much more money to be made in land development. Where millions of pounds can be made pressures increase on public servants. We have had a fine Civil Service and local government officials of great integrity throughout the history of the State, but in recent years cracks have begun to appear. That is very worrying. If they are not halted they could expand and we could end up with a corrupt Civil Service, local government and police force as has occurred in other countries. It must be halted now.
An indication of what was occurring became public when a Garda investigation into the planning process was started. Certain planning scandals were uncovered, not from within the Civil Service or local authorities or from within the planning area. The scandal was discovered by a Garda investigation which arose from the fact that a builder disclosed to the Minister for the Environment certain information with regard to moneys being offered. The former Minister for the Environment, Deputy Flynn, called in the Garda. The Garda investigation proceeded for a time and showed that a senior planner in An Bord Pleanála was involved. An Bord Pleanála is the end of the road for all planning decisions. One cannot go higher and there is no appeal against them. They are the protectors of the planning process. If there is corruption or anything wrong at the lower end of the scale, at county council or corporation level, it comes before An Bord Pleanála and they are the arbiters of supposedly absolute integrity. Yet a senior planner in An Bord Pleanála was arrested by the Garda having been alleged to have received £16,000. That Garda investigation, to my knowledge, was not completed. The last I remember seeing about it in the newspapers was that the superintendent had said that he had now reached a stage where he would have to question certain politicians. I read that in some newspaper, but it never happened.
I date the silence of the superintendent and the halting of that investigation and the end of that story from the date on which Deputy Ray Burke was appointed Minister for Justice. I date it from that time because I cannot recall hearing anything about it since. Perhaps the Minister could tell us what happened to that Garda investigation? Did the superintendent make a report? Did he complete his investigation and make a report? Can the Minister publish that report so that we can see what happened? There was a great furore at the time, but suddenly it ended. That is not what should happen to an investigation. The result should be made public. We should know what happened. We should know who was investigated. We should know which politicians the superintendent wanted to question, why they were not questioned and why the investigation was stopped. Where is that superintendent now? I would like to know that too.
Acting Chairman
I remind the Deputy that he has less than two minutes left.
I would like to hear what happened to that report. That scenario indicates cracks in the system. If there was a corrupt senior planner there must have been other corrupt people down along the line. One person at the top cannot do the thing on his own. There must be a thread running through the builders, speculators, or people of that nature with possibly politicians in between. That should have been investigated. There is need to monitor all of this.
There should be some monitoring also of the famous bovine TB eradication scheme, which has been going on now for from 25 to 30 years. To date £1.5 billion has been spent on the scheme and we are still as bad as ever we were. Where did the money go? I understand that an average of £10 million per year goes to vets. With 1,000 vets, that would be £10,000 per vet. That is not an incentive to them to eradicate TB. There should be an investigation into where the money is going, into who is creaming off this £1.5 billion.
Acting Chairman
I now call Deputy Gay——
I understand that in accordance with the procedure of the House, the Chair will be calling Deputy Gay Mitchell to reply at 8.15 p.m. I understand that Deputy Mitchell's generosity has extended to allow me at least a couple of minutes of that time. I hope the Chair will not object.
Acting Chairman
That is with agreement of the House. Can I take it that Deputy Flanagan is sharing the time before 8.15 p.m. with Deputy Dr. FitzGerald?
Five minutes is all that is at my disposal.
I will share my time with Deputy FitzGerald.
Acting Chairman
With the agreement of the House?
Yes. I will not speak for more than a few minutes. I welcome the opportunity to raise a number of points in support of what is a very thorough and comprehensive motion introduced by the Fine Gael Party. Earlier this year we had an opportunity to discuss some of the matters referred to in the motion but on balance, and with respect to Deputy Howlin of the Labour Party, the debate on the Labour Party Bill was over-concerned with the question of gifts. If I remember correctly, the main speaker for Fianna Fáil on that occasion was the Minister for Finance who dealt almost exclusively with gifts and sidetracked the debate to such an extent that the important issues addressed in the motion were somewhat forgotten.
Clearly the existence of a register of financial and other interests is a necessity, having regard to the workings of our democratic system. Indeed, the constitutional position of this Assembly would require such a register. Even local authorities, on which a vast majority of Members of this House serve, have such a register of interests. This is one more reason for us to have such a procedure on a compulsory basis. In view of the widespread cynicism among the general public, a fact that has been acknowledged by Members on all sides of the House in recent times, we need, as an absolute priority, to get our house in order by means of a comprehensive programme of Dáil reform, including the kind of procedures laid down in this motion. Openess and transparency are necessary in the handling of the business of Parliament. There is a great need for us as legislators to restore the primacy of Parliament in compliance with the place Dáil Éireann is accorded under our Constitution.
When dealing with the question of ethics in Parliament I wish to deplore a practice that has grown in recent years, particularly with reference to the present Government where important announcements of State are made at meetings, functions, dinners and party political gatherings outside the confines of this House.
That was always done.
This further erodes the institution of Dáil Éireann and that must stop. I understand that a register of interests was proposed almost three years ago at the Committee on Procedure and Privileges of this House and has not yet been completed. In replying to public anxiety and because of their indefensible position on the matter, the Government parties were forced in the recent Programme for Government to make reference to such a register. However, the fact that this register of Members is purely voluntary makes it a meaningless and worthless exercise. I would hope that the committee, referred to by Deputy Briscoe, that is to seek to examine this matter will ensure that this register of financial and other interests will be compulsory and that it will be obligatory on Members from the Taoiseach right down to the most junior backbenchers to register their interests, if any.
The second point I wish to refer to is the matter of State funding for political parties which we should have no hesitation in putting in place. This scheme will, of course, be coupled with checks and balances, such as the publication of annual audited accounts of each political party, a ceiling on private donations to political parties and, perhaps most important, a set of regulations dealing with the manner in which candidates spend money at election time. This principle of the State allocating some funds to political parties is already in place and it is important to remember that such State funding, if expanded, would not be spent solely on electioneering but would provide Deputies, being elected Members of this Assembly, with the necessary research and facilities to enable their task as legislators to be undertaken to the best of their ability. It is most unfortunate that when this matter was discussed in the House earlier this year the Progressive Democrats, from outside this Chamber, were prepared to dismiss the matter out of hand. Perhaps it is because of the big business backing of that party, or that the well-heeled professionals that run that party were somewhat afraid that donations to that group and moneys expended by that party on electioneering might some day become public. As public representatives of whatever persuasion——
I would ask the Deputy to conclude within the next few seconds to allow Deputy Gay Mitchell and Deputy Garret FitzGerald time to contribute.
I would ask Deputy Mitchell for just one minute to conclude. Members of the House should be able to contribute freely to debates on the lawmaking process without being compromised from any source. I believe that the setting up of a parliamentary ethics commission, coupled with a commitment for a system of State funding for political parties will allow Government and Deputies to perform their duties under the law and under the Constitution.
In a year when two separate debates took place on this issue it would be a pity if the Government were to use the sledgehammer approach of the division lobbies to defeat this measure in the manner in which the Labour Party Bill was defeated earlier this year. I would ask the Government to have a rethink and between now and the time we vote on this matter to come up with something a little more compromising than the amendment proposed last night by the Minister of State on behalf of the Taoiseach.
I want to make a couple of points. If we look at the Government amendment we see that it differs substantially from the original motion put down by my party. Some of the differences are to the good, adding useful material in regard to State enterprises, State bodies and the standards that should apply there. There is a welcome reference to the taking of steps to ensure the better regulation of those offering investment services. These I would be happy to add to our motion without difficulty.
However, everything else is dropped with the single exception of the introduction of a register of material interests of all Members of the Oireachtas from September 1992, a register which will list the names of the companies and concerns one is associated with, but no more. That is what a register is in other parliaments. What has been dropped is, I think, of great importance. They include two main subjects. One is the concept of disclosure by Members of their financial position or income from other sources, expenditure, liabilties and assets, when they become Ministers and for some years thereafter, not publicly, because that would be to ask more than is necessary and therefore more than is desirable, but to a commission of a kind that would command public acceptance and confidence, that information to be used only if a Minister fails to disclose something that is discovered or if some material information arises that he has behaved financially improperly, in a manner not covered by his disclosure.
We could argue about the composition of the ethics commission. It seems to me that if such a commission is to command confidence amongst the public who are now unhappy and alarmed at the things they have heard, worried about and lacking in confidence in politicians in a way which is very damaging to politicians and politics as a whole, then we need some body which is not simply composed of politicians themselves. How often do politicians themselves — that is the Committee on Procedure and Privileges — in fact deal adequately with problems that may arise? I do not think that would command great confidence. One can argue about the composition of it. What one cannot argue about — and nobody has I think, so far argued about it — is the desirability of having some such system because unless that exists people will not be confident that some politicians, however few they may be, have not in some way derived financial benefit, from their position as politicians, of an improper kind. There is only one way to clear that and that is to establish this system. Yet that has been deleted by the Government with the support of the silent Progressive Democrats who contributed nothing to this debate.
The other provision relates to the financing of politicial parties. That too, has been deleted. I think it is important. I know from my own experience as leader of a party what has happened in our party and I know that at no stage when I was leader, or since, or previously——
Does the Deputy not think he should give my constituency colleague a chance to conclude?
I know that at no stage was money ever received from anybody or any favour given to a person because of it. If there was any suggestion or hint that money was being provided in the expectation of such a favour the money was returned instantly, and that did arise in one or two instances. Can we, however, expect the public to believe that this is true of all parties all the time? Is it right that these doubts should exist when we can resolve the problem by the simple method of having State funding of an impartial kind by some process as set out here? I would like to think that those on the other side of the House from both parties will rethink this in the general interest, their own interests as well as ours. There is no party interest here. The interests of politics are at stake here.
The other points I want to make are simply to endorse what Deputy Mac Giolla has said. I have been very concerned watching that inquiry peter out. I think that if the police inquiry has got nowhere there should be a public inquiry and no amount of inquiry fatigue should prevent an inquiry into that planning scandal to root out any element of misbehaviour in that area so that confidence can be restored where it has now been destroyed in the planning process. That is vital and I entirely endorse what Deputy Mac Giolla has said in that regard.
This has been an interesting, if limited, debate and I am glad the Fine Gael Party have had the opportunity yet again to put this proposal to the House. I am also grateful for the constructive contributions which have been made. I deliberately avoided making any provocative statements or using language which might excite other Members, accusing other parties in the House of being lesser beings or suggesting that this potential weakness was to be found on one side or corner of the House. It affects us all.
I was very disappointed with the Minister of State's reply to my speech. His speech was obviously put together by a number of different Departments and read out badly in the House. Indeed, it took me quite a while to work out exactly what his amendment was saying. The pages of his speech were not numbered, another indication that it was hastily put together, but he stated: "I cannot see how the imposition of the proposed commission would be consistent with this fundamental concept in our Constitution". He went on to speak about the right of the House to regulate its own affairs. It was extraordinary that he should say this some weeks after the Goodman inquiry was set up. It is an extraordinary statement. We are entitled to make whatever laws and regulations we wish once they are consistent with the Constitution and it is wrong to use the Constitution as a shield against the public interest.
The Minister of State went on to ask if it was "being suggested that the electorate of this country have elected a Legislature which is so corrupt that we cannot order our own business or regulate our own Members".
No suggestion along those lines was made and I resent that question. The Minister of State is being defensive. This is the Lower House of Parliament, the important House and it is right that these issues should be raised and debated here. That is our job and that is what we are being paid to do. It is wrong for the Minister of State to come into the House to raise such a question, I presume at the behest of some scriptwriter. I have a higher regard for this House than the person who wrote that script. That is not what lies behind those proposals.
The Minister of State went on to say:
On the question of public funding of political parties once again the main Opposition party have attempted to link this question with the general issue of ethical standards in public life. I suspect a degree of opportunism here.
That is another defensive comment. In my opening speech I quoted what Deputy John Bruton, the Leader of Fine Gael, said in launching Fine Gael's proposals on integrity in public life on 28 November 1990. He said:
Businessmen who seek help from the State, whether through grants or tax concessions, must know that the same rules apply to them as to everyone else. There should be no chosen champions, no sweetheart deals and no discretionary concessions. The same rules should apply to all and be seen to so apply. Fine Gael believe that this requires that there be legislation to guarantee high levels of integrity in public life.
That was said almost one year ago. Why then is there this suggestion of opportunism? The Minister of State made that comment having listened to me read Deputy Bruton's comments into the record. This does nothing for the debate on the very serious issue before the House.
I would like to thank Deputy Howlin and the Labour Party for their support, in principle, for this motion. I was also pleased to be in a position to support, in principle, legislation they introduced about six months ago. I have been led to understand by the members of my party who are members of the Committee on Procedure and Privileges that difficulties were encountered at that committee with the Bill because that Bill included a proposal that information relating to the overdrafts of spouses and related matters should be declared.
We made some modifications.
Some matters should be private and others public. Difficulties were created for the members of parliament in Australia where such a declaration has to be made when the spouse of one member said she was not going to declare her interests and that it was none of parliament's business. She told the High Court the same thing. In many cases our spouses live separate lives. While it is only fair that we should declare our interests it is also fair that spouses and members of our families should declare their interests privately to the commission who would only make their interests public when a conflict of interest arises. That is the reason I believe a parliamentary ethics commission would work. If I had a 21 year-old son, which I do not, I know what he would tell me if I informed him he had to declare his interests. He would tell me to get out of politics. It would be unrealistic to go to those lengths but there is general support in the House for the principle. I appreciate in particular the support of the Labour Party in that regard.
Deputy Briscoe said that we do far more to undermine ourselves than anybody. Perhaps that is true but in the motion before the House I have not sought to point the finger at anybody or to suggest that it arises from any particular case. None of us is in a position to point the finger. I agree with his suggestion that there is a possibility of a conflict of interest in the media, in the trade union movement, in business and in all walks of life but if we want them to put their houses in order we must do so first. If they do not do so we can require them to do so by legislation but we cannot do so if we do not put our own house in order first.
Correct.
I am delighted Deputy Briscoe supports the proposal that there be State funding of political parties. There is all-party support for this proposal despite the fact that the chairman of the Progressive Democrats has other ideas. It is time that these external power bases——
He is now back on side.
——declared their interests.
In the Horse Shoe Bar at the Shelbourne.
Deputy Fitzpatrick made similar comments to those of Deputy Briscoe about the need for a media register and said he had no fundamental complaint about the motion. I am pleased to note he supported it in principle.
Deputy Dennehy was not correct when he said that the commission proposed by Deputy Bruton and I would be another quango and would cost money. The Ombudsman, the Comptroller and Auditor General and High Court judges are all paid by the State. No one is suggesting that they should sit in an office all day waiting for something to happen. It is nonsense to suggest that it would impose a cost on the State. He suggested that this was a knee-jerk reaction to recent events but I would point out to him that in November 1990 Deputy Bruton published proposals in this regard.
Deputy Gilmore also felt it would be a quango.
I was quoting.
(Interruptions.)
I would not mention too much about quangos given what the Deputy did to the Advisory Council on Development Co-operation. His record is not great in that regard.
The Deputy ran away from the Estimates; he had no guts.
It is fair to say——
Let us hear Deputy Mitchell conclude without interruption.
——that if Members of the House were to be subjected to emotive terms once they declared their outside interests this would cause problems as people could have a go at them. I suggest that many Members have interests which they do not want to declare and most of those are not in conflict with their public duty. They are fearful of declaring them, which is what I have done, as they would be held to ridicule and emotive terms would be used against them. That should not happen. We are entitled to presume the honesty and integrity of Members of the House. When I was first elected to the city council in 1979 I had a low regard for the city fathers. I thought they were a lot of old fogies. However, I now have the highest regard for city councillors, Deputies, Senators and MEPs. Many of us have shortcomings but we all set out daily to serve the public interest. Of course, we must take into account the human weakness of temptation. I was asked in a radio interview this morning whether all politicians are crooked. Certainly not, that is not the suggestion behind this. I am one of the people in this House who defend and uphold the rights of Members because we get a raw deal a lot of the time and do not stand up for ourselves. We work hard on hourly rates which would not be tolerated by a decent trade union.
What about our conditions?
I hesitate to interrupt the Deputy but the time has come to put the question.
When we put our house in order we will require the media people who have the temerity to put those questions without any foundation to put their house in order. We will also require the trade unions and the business people outside this House to do the same. However, I appeal to all sides of the House to support this motion to show the people that not alone do we serve the public interest but that we are seen to serve it.
Amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 79; Níl, 76.
Tá
- Ahern, Bertie.
- Ahern, Dermot.
- Ahern, Michael.
- Andrews, David.
- Aylward, Liam.
- Barrett, Michael.
- Brady, Gerard.
- Brady, Vincent.
- Brennan, Mattie.
- Brennan, Séamus.
- Briscoe, Ben.
- Browne, John (Wexford).
- Burke, Raphael P.
- Calleary, Seán.
- Callely, Ivor.
- Clohessy, Peadar.
- Connolly, Ger.
- Coughlan, Mary Theresa.
- Cowen, Brian.
- Cullimore, Séamus.
- Daly, Brendan.
- Davern, Noel.
- Dempsey, Noel.
- Dennehy, John.
- de Valera, Síle.
- Ellis, John.
- Fahey, Frank.
- Fahey, Jackie.
- Fitzgerald, Liam Joseph.
- Fitzpatrick, Dermot.
- Flood, Chris.
- Flynn, Pádraig.
- Gallagher, Pat the Cope.
- O'Rourke, Mary.
- O'Toole, Martin Joe.
- Power, Seán.
- Quill, Máirín.
- Reynolds, Albert.
- Roche, Dick.
- Stafford, John.
- Geoghegan-Quinn, Máire.
- Harney, Mary.
- Haughey, Charles J.
- Hilliard, Colm.
- Hyland, Liam.
- Jacob, Joe.
- Kelly, Laurence.
- Kenneally, Brendan.
- Kirk, Séamus.
- Kitt, Michael P.
- Kitt, Tom.
- Lawlor, Liam.
- Lenihan, Brian.
- Leonard, Jimmy.
- Leyden, Terry.
- Lyons, Denis.
- Martin, Micheál.
- McCreevy, Charlie.
- McDaid, Jim.
- McEllistrim, Tom.
- Molloy, Robert.
- Morley, P.J.
- Nolan, M.J.
- Noonan, Michael J. (Limerick West).
- O'Connell, John.
- O'Dea, Willie.
- O'Donoghue, John.
- O'Hanlon, Rory.
- O'Keeffe, Ned.
- O'Kennedy, Michael.
- O'Leary, John.
- O'Malley, Desmond J.
- Treacy, Noel.
- Tunney, Jim.
- Wallace, Dan.
- Wallace, Mary.
- Wilson, John P.
- Woods, Michael.
- Wyse, Pearse.
Níl
- Ahearn, Therese.
- Allen, Bernard.
- Barnes, Monica.
- Barrett, Seán.
- Barry, Peter.
- Bell, Michael.
- Belton, Louis J.
- Boylan, Andrew.
- Bradford, Paul.
- Browne, John (Carlow-Kilkenny).
- Bruton, John.
- Bruton, Richard.
- Byrne, Eric.
- Carey, Donal.
- Connaughton, Paul.
- Connor, John.
- Cosgrave, Michael Joe.
- Cotter, Bill.
- Creed, Michael.
- Crowley, Frank.
- Currie, Austin.
- D'Arcy, Michael.
- Deasy, Austin.
- De Rossa, Proinsias.
- Doyle, Joe.
- Durkan, Bernard.
- Enright, Thomas W.
- Farrelly, John V.
- Fennell, Nuala.
- Ferris, Michael.
- Finucane, Michael.
- FitzGerald, Garret.
- Flaherty, Mary.
- Flanagan, Charles.
- Foxe, Tom.
- Gilmore, Eamon.
- Gregory, Tony.
- Harte, Paddy.
- Higgins, Jim.
- Higgins, Michael D.
- Hogan, Philip.
- Howlin, Brendan.
- Kavanagh, Liam.
- Kemmy, Jim.
- Kenny, Enda.
- Lee, Pat.
- Lowry, Michael.
- McCartan, Pat.
- McCormack, Pádraic.
- McGahon, Brendan.
- McGinley, Dinny.
- Mac Giolla, Tomás.
- McGrath, Paul.
- Mitchell, Gay.
- Mitchell, Jim.
- Moynihan, Michael.
- Nealon, Ted.
- Noonan, Michael (Limerick East).
- O'Brien, Fergus.
- O'Keeffe, Jim.
- O'Shea, Brian.
- O'Sullivan, Gerry.
- O'Sullivan, Toddy.
- Pattison, Séamus.
- Quinn, Ruairí.
- Rabbitte, Pat.
- Reynolds, Gerry.
- Ryan, Seán.
- Shatter, Alan.
- Sheehan, Patrick J.
- Sherlock, Joe.
- Spring, Dick.
- Stagg, Emmet.
- Taylor-Quinn, Madeleine.
- Timmins, Godfrey.
- Yates, Ivan.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies V. Brady and Clohessy; Níl, Deputies Flanagan and Boylan.
Question declared carried.
Question, "That the motion, as amended, be agreed to" put and declared carried.