There are two recommendations in the names of Senator Garret FitzGerald and Senator Rooney. The Chair suggests that they be taken together.
Finance (No. 2) Bill, 1966: ( Certified Money Bill ) Report and Final Stages.
Yes, they are consequential. I move recommendation No. 1:
In pages 3, lines 11 and 12, to delete "but excepting any such seller who is—" and between lines 12 and 13 to insert a new paragraph as follows:—
"(b) Notwithstanding paragraph (a) a seller shall be accountable for and liable to pay wholesale tax who is".
This arises out of what was said a few moments ago in an attempt to clear up and make unambiguous both what is obscure and ambiguous in the section. I pointed out that the words "but expecting any such seller" could be read as applying to the immediately preceding subclause, that is, "and are not likely in any month to exceed £500", or the whole of subsection (a) or could refer back to the main clause. I gather from the discussion of the Minister that the intention is that the people referred to in subsections (1) and (2), manufacturer or retailer, shall be excluded from the operation of the whole of subsection (a), whereas the present wording is ambiguous and may not give effect to what is the Minister's intention. The simplest way would be to terminate subsection (a) at £500 and put in the new subsection (b) which would include the remainder of (a) and also the present (b) and which would say quite clearly that "notwithstanding paragraph (a) a seller shall be accountable for and liable to pay wholesale tax who is (i) a manufacturer of, (ii) a person who makes." It is a tidying up operation. The present subparagraph (b) is unnecessary and a separate clause. I am afraid I have put no verb in my recommendation, I am sorry. We will have to insert a verb in order to make sense of my subsection (b).
Recommendation No. 2 is not of itself essential. The same recommendation would be required to convert the present subsection (b) into the new (b) but my particular wording is not satisfactory and would need some slight change. If the Minister would agree to the first recommendation which would clear matters up we should not have such difficulty in coping with the secondary problem of the second recommendation.
I admire Senator FitzGerald's drafting. He did a good job in a short time and it would seem to me he has conveyed the meaning with a slight omission of the verb in the second recommendation that I understand the section to mean already. That is the nub of the question. I am not suggesting the parliamentary draftsman is omniscient in these matters but he is a person whose advice I am prepared to accept. I want to assure the House that when the purposes of this section were put to him and when his draft appeared and was discussed with him he was satisfied that it was fully effective by the wording he had already incorporated in section 3 as a whole. I admit it requires careful reading but I do not accept that there is ambiguity in it.
The Senator suggested particularly that there might be ambiguity in so far as paragraph (a) of subsection (1) is concerned and that the word "sellers" is used at the beginning of the paragraph and "seller" is used as the third last word of the paragraph as well, but the latter word "seller" may, as well, apply to the word "sellers" at the beginning of the paragraph as the word "seller" in subsection (1). I am satisfied that the proper interpretation of this word is that the word "seller", the third last word in sub-paragraph (a), refers to the word "sellers" at the beginning of paragraph (a), and I am satisfied there is no ambiguity whatever in it and reluctantly, much as I admire the Senator's efforts for clarification and I think he succeeded to a degree, I must resist his Recommendation.
I have been on a number of occasions unhappy at reactions of Ministers on proposed amendments who will not accept them because the parliamentary draftsman did it the other way and he must be right. I think the Minister said the parliamentary draftsman is not omniscient but he proceeded to treat him as if he were. The fact is that the Minister is responsible for the Bill, its clarity and its ambiguity. He is properly advised in this matter but he must be prepared either when a proposal or a suggested amendment is made to consult with the parliamentary draftsman or to have got from him the reasoning that led him to adopt such dubious verbiage or else accept the change which is clearly a clarification. It is unsatisfactory for Ministers to say "I do not understand what it is about, but the parliamentary draftsman said it and I will not accept amendment on it".
I do not accept that.
Senator FitzGerald is the only one who does not understand it.
I refute the suggestion that it is ambiguous. To understand it properly requires careful reading as any statute does.
It requires more than that. My point is simply that the Minister is accepting that the recommendation I provided is one which does on the face of it clarify the intention.
I said to a degree.
Right, the Minister has covered himself in some measure.
Clearly, it is another way of doing it.
The reason given for not accepting my recommendation is that the parliamentary draftsman drafted the Bill in this way and no reason is given for his drafting it in a way that, prima facie is ambiguous. That is the reason given. If the Minister explained to me why it is drafted this way and why my recommendation, though to a degree acceptable, is not accepted I would accept it immediately. I think we must call a halt to the fact that we must accept on faith what the parliamentary draftsman does. We cannot demand an explanation why he did it; we just have to accept it and any change cannot be accepted because the parliamentary draftsman drafted it that way and has not deigned to explain why he did it that way. That is what I am objecting to. I am willing to accept there is a good reason.
It might be dangerous to accept my recommendation but I do not know enough about it to accept that. But, there is a prima facie case for accepting my recommendation and the parliamentary draftsman is not here to tell us the reason why he chose that form of wording. If the reasons were given I would accept it. I find it very hard to accept that I need not be told the reason why the parliamentary draftsman has done it that way. We have had this in this House on a number of occasions recently and I find that this is a most unsatisfactory response from Ministers. In future Ministers should be prepared to justify the wording in their Bills. If they get a Bill from the parliamentary draftsman which is ambiguous they should find out why it has been put in that way and if we are given a reasonable argument we are always prepared to accept it.
We are on the Fourth Stage and the debate is now concluded.
If I want to say "I want to go home" and if somebody else says "I want to retire to my dwelling", I do not have to ask the person to clarify it.
Recommendation, by leave, withdrawn.
Recommendation No. 2 not moved.
Bill received for final consideration and ordered to be returned to the Dáil.