I move:
That, pursuant to subsection 2º of section 2 of Article 25 of the Constitution, Seanad Éireann concurs with the Government in a request to the President to sign the Social Welfare Bill, 1986, on a date which is earlier than the fifth day after the date on which the Bill shall have been presented to him.
Since section 17 has to come into operation on 1 April there is not the normal time available to the President for consideration of this Bill. Accordingly the Government have decided, that with the concurrence of Seanad Éireann a request should be made to the President for early signature of this Bill.
I want to say, as I say on every occasion on which I move an earlier signature motion, that it is always a matter of great regret I have to move an earlier signature motion. It always seems that the times when the President's period for consideration is reduced by the passage of the motion are also times in which the period for consideration by the Seanad has been curtailed. While Senators received a copy of this Bill, on its circulation on 2 March, we did not receive the Bill, as amended by the Dáil, until 20 March. Accordingly, our complete consideration of this Bill has had to be compressed into six days, whereas the time for consideration available to Dáil Éireann was 17 days. While I am prepared to accept that Senators may be twice as intelligent as Members of the Dáil. I do not think we could claim to be three times as intelligent and able to consider matters of this importance in one-third of the time. As I indicated when talking on section 22, this position is one which the Seanad must deprecate. Indeed, we must urge on Ministers that legislation will have to be introduced, in whichever House, in time for due deliberation by both Houses, otherwise there will continue to be difficulty and the day will come when the Seanad — at a time most inconvenient to Ministers and to Dáil Éireann — will decide that it must amend a particular piece of legislation.