Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 21 Jul 1971

Vol. 70 No. 17

Higher Education Authority Bill, 1970: Report Stage (Resumed).

Professor Quinlan

I move amendment No. 6.

In page 3, line 48, after "and" to insert "new developments shall be".

If the Minister will see the logic in the amendments we are proposing it will shorten the proceedings very much. We return to section 12 and to the very dangerous type of earmarking or attachment of conditions that is allowed to An tÚdarás under section 12, subsection (2). This is something that is not accepted under the university grants committee in England. It is accepted that it is legitimate to attach conditions to new developments. However, if we are going on the theory that all men are reasonable and that all institutions are reasonable, we do not need conditions attached to anything. To be a little more down to earth than that, it is reasonable enough that conditions can be attached to new developments. The Minister has gone on record as saying that An tÚdarás would not attach conditions except where these were reasonable, in other words, indicate new developments.

We are particularly worried about the fact that the Minister did not commit himself, and neither does the Bill commit itself, on the question of whether sanctions under section 12 would be applied to an institution if it did not comply with a request from An tÚdarás under section 11 which it probably thought unreasonable. It is now doubly necessary that this safeguard should be put in. All we ask is that we should insert the words: "and new developments shall be subject to such conditions as An tÚdarás think fit," limiting the attachment of conditions to new developments.

That is reasonable and the Minister would agree that that is what he has in mind. At no time in the past has the Minister's Department sought to attach conditions to what was already going on. It would be a very retrograde step to allow An tÚdarás even the possibility of doing this. Consequently, in order to facilitate the Leader of the House, in his anxiety to finish this, I appeal to the Minister to accept this amendment. It could not be more reasonable or more self-explanatory.

Mr. Faulkner

I am afraid that I cannot accept that this amendment is reasonable. The amendment would deny An tÚdarás the authority to make conditions in connection with payments to institutions, except in relation to new developments. In the administration of grants to institutions, An tÚdarás must of course have regard to the general and to the specific functions assigned to them under this Bill. In the matter of attaching conditions to payments of grants to institutions regard must be had in particular to the general function of assisting in the co-ordination of State investment in higher education. An tÚdarás must also have regard to the duty laid on them in section 10 in regard to the maintenance of a reasonable balance in the distribution of the total number of students as between institutions. In other words, it must in general take a global view of the development of higher education and relate the general demand and need for higher education to the demands and proposals of the individual institutions.

One wonders, in connection with this amendment, what would be understood by new developments. If, for instance, an institution decided to substantially increase its intake of students into a particular faculty without regard to the fact that the existing output of graduates from that faculty was greater than what the economy could absorb, would this be classed as a new development? I should be inclined to say that it would not. Therefore, in making grants to the institution in question, An tÚdarás, if the section were amended as suggested, would have no authority to specify any condition in relation to the expansion of a particular faculty beyond what would be reasonable.

In other words, An tÚdarás would be inhibited in such an instance in fulfilling their function of assisting in the co-ordination of State investment in higher education. The same argument would hold for the running down of a particular faculty beyond what would be desirable. Again, in regard to capital grants, An tÚdarás, though they would assess the grants on the basis of certain specific projects, would be inhibited from requiring that the grants should be spent on such projects. I went into this particular matter in some detail on the Committee Stage.

It would be normal for An tÚdarás to make a condition in relation to recurrent grants for an institution that certain sums within the total grant should be spent on, for example, the necessary renewal of equipment, repairs, adaptations and so on and that payments for these items would be made only on receipt of vouchers for the expenditure incurred on them. This amendment would not allow for this, although it is a practice which has long existed in the administration of recurrent grants to the university colleges and has generally been accepted as reasonable. For these reasons I cannot accept this amendment. I regard it as another bid to weaken the status of An tÚdarás.

Professor Quinlan

I am sorry we have not got what the Minister set out before us because it contains many frightening suggestions as to how An tÚdarás might interfere with what are regarded as an autonomous body. I take it that what the Minister said about the running down of a certain faculty below a prescribed level could be attached to the condition. In other words, the Minister is now saying that An tÚdarás can attach a condition that instruction in such a subject should be discontinued.

Mr. Faulkner

I will not argue that particular point with the Senator, but that is not what I said.

Professor Quinlan

The opposite is that if the running down of a faculty below a prescribed level occurred, An tÚdarás could put in a condition that such a department shall not go below a prescribed level. Surely, if this is allowed, it is equally admissible that the corresponding requirements of a faculty should be eliminated altogether? That opens up some frightening possibilities of real interference with the right of universities to decide on their courses.

No outside body should have the right to remove faculties. One of the cardinal points in the NUI/TCD agreement was that the universities concerned were not prepared to grant that right to anybody. They regarded it as a key factor in maintaining university autonomy. The more we go into this, the more dangerous it becomes. All we have is the assurance that An tÚdarás will be composed of reasonable men. That is a very weak safeguard. However, since Senator Dooge's amendment No. 7 is more explicit, I will withdraw amendment No. 6 and later support amendment No. 7.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Professor Dooge

I move amendment No. 7:

In page 3, to add to section 12 the following:

"(3) No condition may be attached to a payment by An tÚdarás under subsection (2) of this section which would have the effect of forcing an institution of higher education to undertake any activity which was not the subject of a request for State subvention by that institution under section 8 of this Act."

This amendment would have the effect that An tÚdarás could not attach such conditions to any grant of money which would have the effect of forcing an institution of higher education to do something which, in their own academic opinion, was an activity which it was not desirable for them to undertake. We suffer from the disadvantage of not having available the printed proceedings of the debate on Committee Stage. However, it is my recollection on that occasion the Minister stated quite categorically that no institution of higher education would be forced to undertake any activity against their will. This amendment aims to write that opinion expressed by the Minister into the Statute. There appears to be no difference of opinion between us. It may well be that the difference between us is that my degree of anxiety in regard to this matter is greater than the Minister's. My estimate of the probability of something undesirable happening in this regard is higher than the Minister's estimate of that probability.

This amendment is the very minimum that can be asked if the autonomy of the institutions of higher education has any real meaning—that conditions may only be attached to those matters for which they have sought State support. The argument has been continuously made that because there is a degree of State support there must be very close control. This argument is made on the basis that this is democratic. If we take heed, not of the forms of democracy but of the inner purpose of democracy, we may well find that to exercise close control over institutions of higher education is a very undemocratic thing.

The basis of our western parliamentary democracy, as we practice it, is that men living in freedom will live fuller lives and will be more productive, economically, socially and intellectually, than if they live lives under close control. That is the basis of our western parliamentary democracy. It is the application of that principle to our democratic institutions, to institutions of higher education, that gives rise to the whole principle of the autonomy of such bodies. It is a principle which, of course, is limited and circumscribed; but it is in danger of being circumscribed out of existence. If we look not to the forms of democracy, not to the particular political institutions that are set up in regard to political matters, but at the fundamental beliefs that we have that freedom is a proper habitat of man, then we might see the matter in a different light.

I feel that any suggestion, such as was implicit in an intervention by Senator Eoin Ryan on the Committee Stage, that conditions could be attached to grants for certain purposes in order to make the universities do something else or make other institutions of higher education do something which they felt was not proper for them to do, is highly undesirable and this is the reason why this amendment has been put down. The force of the amendment is clear. There is no need for me to debate the matter at great length, except to say that this amendment is an embodiment of an opinion expressed by the Minister on Committee Stage.

Mr. Faulkner

As Senator Dooge has said, we both suffer from the disadvantage of not having before us the printed debate. Nevertheless I do not differ from him in what he has stated. What I said was that I could not visualise An tÚdarás withholding grants in order to force an institution of higher education to do something they did not want to do. This amendment would restrain An tÚdarás from attaching any condition to a payment to a particular institution, whether in the form of capital or current grant, which would force the institution to undertake an activity which it did not wish to undertake and in respect of which it had made no application for State financial aid through An tÚdarás.

I do not mean this in any disparaging way, but this appears to me to be a manifestation of the bogey man complex which some people seem to have in relation to An tÚdarás. No reasonable person could envisage An tÚdarás threatening to withhold grants from an institution because that institution was unwilling to take on some activity which An tÚdarás might wish it to take on. Here again I am being asked to accept an amendment which is based on the assumption that An tÚdarás would be unreasonable, irresponsible and dictatorial. I refuse to accept this and if I were to accept it I do not think it would be possible to ensure by legislation that a body which was fundamentally unreasonable and irresponsible could be got to act in a rational and satisfactory manner. I am convinced that An tÚdarás could not function except in an atmosphere of consultation and mutual respect. If anything were calculated to ensure that this particular type of atmosphere would not exist, it is proposed in an amendment such as this. For those reasons I regret that I cannot accept the amendment.

Professor Kelly

It was the distinguished father of the present Cathaoirleach who said in this House that nobody had the right, whether in a fit of absentmindedness or to flatter fanatics, to forge an instrument of tyranny and say that it would never be used. It seems to me that that thought is a similar one to that which we, on this side of the House, have been trying for three weeks to get across to the Minister and his advisers, namely, no one has the right in a fit of absentmindedness or otherwise to forge a legal instrument, which is what a Bill will be, of entirely erratic and unpredictable application and simply say that it will never be abused. We have not got that right in this House and the Minister ought not to put the thing forward on that basis.

The Minister has behaved in this House on this occasion and on other occasions—I hope he will not mind my saying this—with complete politeness towards everybody. He has not annoyed anybody and he has not been responsible for angry words, and that is something which does not occur with every Minister. I do not like speaking hard words to him for that reason, but he has failed—whether because his officials have advised him in that direction or because of an innate disinclination to take advice from the other side—to meet the point, which in one form or other has been put forward from this side of the House on many sections, that the Bill as it stands will work quite well if it is operated by reasonable people such as the Minister envisages in the first instance, but will work very badly if its operation is entrusted in the future to unreasonable people, and we cannot foresee what the future holds. Our job, as legislators is to make sure, so far as we can do it, that the legislation we pass is watertight and leaves no room for abuse.

The Minister said he could not visualise a situation arising in which the powers of the Authority under section 12 would be used in order to force a university or other institution of higher education to do something which it did not want to do. If he cannot visualise that situation arising, what does he visualise in the words "subject to such conditions"? Surely the word "conditions" automatically implies and calls to mind that there may be a conflict between the university or other institution and the Authority? There may be a situation in which the university states: "We do not want to do this thing; we do not feel we are able to do it; we are not equipped to do it; we do not think it has an educational value." The Authority says: "Well, you are damn well going to have to do it and if you will not do it you are not going to get the money." I can see no other way of reading the words "subject to such conditions as An tÚdarás thinks fit" other than to understand them as contemplating a possible conflict, maybe not an illtempered conflict but a potential or incipient conflict of opinion between an institution and the Authority.

I cannot therefore see the reasonableness of the Minister's inability to visualise the section being used to force an institution to do something which they do not wish to do when the section seems to me patently to be designed for that very purpose. I do not say it is designed for the purpose of bullying an institution, but it is clearly designed for the purpose of making it necessary for institutions to apply funds in a certain way and subject to certain conditions, and that necessarily implies that their freedom to spend the money as they think best themselves is to be limited.

I have never put forward in this House or elsewhere the idea that a university should be an absolutely independent island and that it should spend the people's money as it thinks fit. I do not believe in absolute university autonomy and I have never put forward that point, but the university will not be any good to the nation unless it has a sphere of independent judgment within its own proper area which is the area of deciding what is an appropriate standard, what were appropriate subjects, what was an appropriate discipline, what would make a good degree course and what would not, what are the appropriate admission standards and so on. These are the proper subjects for university autonomy.

This subsection, and it is not the only subsection in this Bill which is open to abuse, makes it possible for the Authority to impose on the paying of money some such condition as: "We will pay you this money but on condition that you devote a proportion of it to the provision of, let us say, degrees, courses or diplomas, perhaps night classes or part-time courses", which the institution does not think educationally worthwhile.

This is what I believe Senator Dooge had in mind when he spoke some time ago, although he did not use quite the same words. It is an important point and while I might not have drafted Senator Dooge's amendment in quite the same way—we can all differ as regards draftsmanship—the point which is implicit in Senator Dooge's and Senator Belton's amendment is a solid point and I am disappointed if the Minister brushes it aside as being of no importance, as he has brushed aside every amendment put forward from this side of the House since these debates began.

Mr. Crinion

As I see it, this is just another of those amendments, first, to take power away from the Minister and give it to An tÚdarás, than to take the power from An tÚdarás and give it to the faculties themselves. This would be a very bad thing. The faculties could say what they wanted to do and not An tÚdarás, which is the body responsible for higher education.

If An tÚdarás feels the faculty should do something, it should have the power to request the faculty to do it. If this amendment were implemented and the faculty got their money, they could say, "There is one project we do not want money for"—for example, as Senator Kelly has said, a night class—"We feel that we should not carry out that", although An tÚdarás, which is responsible for higher education, feel that it should be done.

In that way this section would be taking away power from An tÚdarás. Even though the intentions may be the best, a situation could arise in the future which would have a detrimental effect and would cause quite an amount of friction where the faculty could say to An tÚdarás: "We do not want to do this" and An tÚdarás would have no power to insist.

For that reason I suggest that this amendment should not be accepted. The second as written is explicit enough. It gives sufficient power to An tÚdarás. The Minister has given an undertaking that he feels nobody will try to force anything through. It has always been an accepted thing in our legislation that you take the power, you take the big stick, but you do not use it. This type of legislation has worked very well over the years. If the amendment were accepted it would give too much power to the faculties themselves and take it away from An tÚdarás, which would be a dangerous situation and could lead to friction if a certain situation arose. For that reason I would support rejecting this amendment.

Professor Quinlan

Senator Crinion really summed it up when he said: "The Minister has given an undertaking that he feels this would not be used to force anything on anybody". What kind of a kindergarten are we turning into as a Legislature? This has been the approach against the very reasonable amendments that we have advocated all through. We are not prepared to accept undertakings from a Minister about his feelings. The Supreme Court is not going to consider the undertakings given by a Minister in the Seanad much less the undertakings that he gives us about his feelings, which must be the lowest form of undertaking one can give. Such an inconsequential statement is beyond me. We are told to accept that nobody will abuse a section, that a section will not be used outside its normal use. The most glaring example of this was five years ago when, as a result of agitation by farming organisations, the Government eventually conceded an extra payment on milk.

An Cathaoirleach

I do not think this has anything to do with the Higher Education Authority Bill.

Professor Quinlan

It relates very much——

An Cathaoirleach

I do not think it does. I do not think the price of milk either this year or five years ago comes under the Higher Education Authority Bill.

Professor Quinlan

It does not. I agree completely that milk has nothing to do with education, but there was a certain activity which shall be nameless. To finance this the Government decided at that point in time to put on an extra 1d on the packet of cigarettes. How did they do it? There was anti-dumping legislation and under that legislation they put on an extra 1d on the packet of cigarettes, ostensibly to prevent dumping.

An Cathaoirleach

Would the Senator care to relate these to the Higher Education Authority Bill—dumping, cigarettes, milk?

Professor Quinlan

It shall be nameless as to what they wished to do but the fact is that legislation was used, has been used, and will be used again for purposes that are not in keeping with the original intentions of it but for purposes that come within a cold, legal analysis of what the Bill says. We are trying to prevent this. All we are left with is the Bill. The proceedings of the Seanad stay behind. In any case nobody ever reads them. The Irish Independent has decided to put a ban on those.

I appeal to the Minister to meet us at least some part of the way on this. Let us feel that we have done some good here by devoting study and time to the problems at hand and that at least we can claim that there must be some value in the ideas we have come up with, having debated this Bill for three weeks. This Bill is headed to set a record as the first major Bill on a non-political issue that has come before the Seanad, and it is about to leave it unchanged in any way. I do not know whether that is a tribute to the Minister and his infallible advisers or if it means that we on this side have not been cogent enough in advocating our amendments. In any case it is a poor show by any standards.

Mr. J. Fitzgerald

I have a certain amount of sympathy with this amendment. We cannot accept the undertakings which have been given by the Minister because, as Senator Quinlan has rightly pointed out, these will not be accepted by the Supreme Court. The mere fact that the Minister is reduced to giving undertakings that the section does not mean what we think it is intended to mean is, in itself, an argument in favour of changing the section so that there will be no need for this Minister or any other Minister to have to give this type of undertaking in relation to any section in the Bill. It should be copperfastened in such a way as to eliminate any doubt as to how the section may be used or abused by An tÚdarás or by anybody else.

Mr. E. Ryan

How does the mover of this amendment reconcile it with section 3 of the Bill? Surely An tÚdarás has obligations not merely to say they do not approve of certain things but also that they have obligations to take a positive attitude in suggesting to institutions that they do certain things? If An tÚdarás is merely to have what amounts to a kind of veto on certain things it cannot properly fulfil its functions. It must be in a position from time to time, in my view, to suggest to institutions that they should consider doing certain things. It must be in a position, if necessary, to say that unless an institution undertakes to do something which An tÚdarás feels is necessary to be done if they are to fulfil their functions, then An tÚdarás will have no power to ensure that its functions are in fact fulfilled. So it seems to me that this amendment would prevent An tÚdarás from properly fulfilling its positive functions.

Professor Dooge

Firstly, I should like to refer to some of the Minister's comments. The Minister said that the Authority set up under this Bill will only make the contribution to the welfare of the country that it is capable of if it has mutual respect. He went on to say that he thought nothing could be more harmful to mutual respect than the adoption of an amendment of this type. Mutual respect? We are talking here about mutual respect: we are talking about a job that has got to be done by a number of people working in co-operation, and if the universities have continually to depend on the forbearance of An tÚdarás for a modicum and a residium of what has been the traditional freedom of universities, then it will be extremely difficult for this mutual respect to have any real meaning.

We had the position in this country that has been true in many countries. It was considered that, once certain principles had been determined, the public advantage was best served by leaving it to institutions of higher education themselves to determine what should be done and how it should be done. There are powers in this Bill for An tÚdarás to say to every institution of higher education what it should do and how it should do it. This is undesirable. The Minister in his comment said that the members of An tÚdarás will be reasonable people. He finds it difficult to imagine that they will at any time attach conditions to a function which would force any institution of higher education to do something against its will. His view is not shared by Senator Crinion. His view is not shared by Senator Ryan. They have no difficulty in imagining this happening. So far from having difficulty in imagining that an institution of higher education would be forced to do something against its will, they would like to see it forced to do something against its will.

I agree with the Minister that the persons whom we will appoint to An tÚdarás will be reasonable people and I agree that when the Government appointed Senator Ryan, a Member of the Seanad, to the National University, they appointed a reasonable person to that body. But we find this reasonable person who we might think, since he has already been nominated by the Government to an academic body, is perhaps a prototype of those who but for a certain section in this Bill would be nominated to An tÚdarás. Yet Senator Ryan has said here today, as he said the last day, that he does not feel An tÚdarás can carry out its duties under section 3 unless it can exercise a sanction so that institutions of higher education are not merely left in the position of refusing money if they do not think the conditions are right, not asking for money if they do not think the activity is appropriate, but leaving these institutions in the position that they will carry out all of their activities to the ruling and in accordance with the writ of the Higher Education Authority or they will not be allowed to carry them out at all.

As I say, we have on the one hand the assurance of the Minister that this amendment would do harm to mutual respect and be unnecessary because these things cannot be envisaged. We had Senator Ryan saying that these things are needed, that these things are an integral part of the Bill and are called for by section 3. We have the revealing phrase from Senator Crinion who says that we have in most legislation "the big stick"—and Senator Crinion wants the big stick in this Bill. He does not want this amendment passed because it would remove one of the cudgels which are being placed in the hands of An tÚdarás by this particular Bill. It may be that there is a genuine divergence of opinion between the Minister and Government Senators in this House in this regard but there are certainly two points of view. How are we to be sure which point of view is to prevail among the nominees of the Government who become members of An tÚdarás?

Professor Quinlan

Senator Crinion may be Minister for Education.

Mr. Crinion

That will never happen.

Professor Dooge

We are concerned about the liberty of the universities. As I mentioned in this House before, our concern is not for our own sake but because the practice in western Europe has shown that when the universities are free the public welfare is well served. Nothing could prove more the fact that an amendment such as this is needed than the contribution to this discussion by Senator Ryan and by Senator Crinion here today.

Amendment put and declared lost.

An Cathaoirleach

Would the Senator agree to take amendments Nos. 8 and 9 together? They seem to relate to similar topics.

Professor Dooge

Yes. I moved amendment No. 8:

In page 5 to delete lines 50 to 52 inclusive and substitute:—

"(2) The Chairman of An tÚdarás may at any time resign his office as chairman by letter sent to the Minister, and the resignation shall, unless it is previously withdrawn in writing, take effect at the commencement of the meeting of An tÚdarás held next after An tÚdarás has been informed by the Minister of the resignation."

Amendment No. 8 is concerned with the manner of resignation from An tÚdarás. Amendment No. 9 is concerned with the manner of resignation of an ordinary member of An tÚdarás. I raised on Committee Stage the question of the difficulties which might be created by leaving the provision for resignation in the form in which it is in the Bill at the moment.

At the moment the provision in regard to the resignation of both the chairman and an ordinary member is the same. They may resign by a letter addressed to the Minister and the resignation shall take effect when the letter is received. I take it that this means—recall the Ministers and Secretaries Act—that when this letter is stamped in the registry of the Department of Education the position then is that the resignation is effective There is not even a guarantee here that the resignation must be received by the Minister in his personal capacity before the resignation becomes effective. This is undesirable. Firstly, if somebody who has been appointed to a post as a result of a Government decision is to resign from this post, the resignation should be in concordance with the manner of his appointment.

At the very least these resignations should reach the Minister and, as I said the last day, I think it reasonable to allow a certain time so that the Minister could, if he so wished, discuss with an individual the reasons for the resignation and, in the event of a resignation being on a point of principle, to see if some accord could not be reached which might make this resignation unnecessary. This is particularly true in the case of the chairman and accordingly I have in amendment No. 8 put down the resignation procedure which was embodied in the Nuclear Energy Bill. It allows for the fact that a chairman's resignation would be notified to the board and would become effective following its notification to the board by the Minister.

In the case of an ordinary member the difficulty about resignations becoming absolutely operative in what might be a premature fashion was met in the Nuclear Energy Bill by the form which is here in amendment No. 9. It may well be that nine out of ten resignations will be for genuine ill health. Nevertheless, if there are to be resignations on points of principle, or even resignations on such grounds as overwork or something of this type, they should be allowed time for reconsideration, time for discussion. That is what is being provided for in these amendments.

Mr. Faulkner

The sections as they stand in the Bill are much superior to the amendments. I have already discussed this on Committee Stage with Senator Dooge. If the chairman should for any reason wish to resign it may be assumed that he would have given the matter serious consideration before committing his decision to writing and sending it to the Minister. If his reasons for resigning were such that he might withdraw his resignation after discussion with the Minister or with someone else, during the interim period which the adoption of this amendment would allow him a man of the calibre of the chairman of An tÚdarás would surely have discussions before writing out his resignation and sending it to the Minister.

Senators have allowed themselves the luxury of proposing amendments to guard against ill-intentioned Ministers and irresponsible members of An tÚdarás. I could perhaps suggest that we could have a type of chairman—I am not suggesting that we will—who might send in his resignation immediately after each meeting and withdraw it before the commencement of the next meeting. This is not any more fanciful than some of the things that have been said on amendments to guard against this type of thing.

Professor Dooge

I hope the Minister is not referring to these amendments.

Mr. Faulkner

No, I am not. Might I add that if a chairman were a person who would hand in his resignation in a fit of pique it is very doubtful if he would be a suitable person to continue in office as chairman. Surely a man possessing the balance and the judgement needed for the office of chairman would not lightly tender his resignation.

With regard to amendment No. 9, while in amendment No. 8 there was mention of when the resignation of the chairman would take effect, in this section as it stands, there is provision as to when the resignation of an ordinary member would take effect. The proposed amendment avoids all mention of when the resignation would take place. If I could follow what Senator Dooge mentioned, would it be the time of the writing of the letter, or the time of posting, or the time when the Minister receives the letter? Would it be at the commencement of the next meeting? The section as it stands is very much more definite and much more satisfactory. The section in its prese form provides for the manner in which an ordinary member may resign and for the time when that resignation comes into effect. All this amendment proposes to do is to omit the reference to the resignations taking effect at a particular time. I do not think that this would in any sense improve the Bill.

Professor Dooge

I agree with the Minister's criticism of amendment No. 9. It is not in the form in which I proposed it in the Nuclear Energy Bill. It is the form which the Minister adopted in the Nuclear Energy Bill. It is the form the parliamentary draftsman produced for the Nuclear Energy Bill. I heartily agree with the Minister that it would be a much better amendment if in fact it said that the resignation took place at the commencement of the meeting next following of the body. Here, the Minister has shown throughout this Bill a great respect for the artifice of the parliamentary draftsmen. I think it would be a pity if he lost it on the last amendment because it is not my handiwork. I think that these provisions would be better if they were in the form they are in in amendment No. 8 and amendment No. 9 rather than if they were as in the Bill. Having said that, if the Minister is not willing to accept them, I only hope that the differences between the two will not arise in the course of the operations of An tÚdarás.

Amendment put and declared lost.

Amendment No. 9 not moved.

Bill received for final consideration.