Special Committee National Board for Science and Technology Bill, 1976 debate -
Wednesday, 18 May 1977

SECTION 8.

Mr. O'Malley

I move amendment No. 8:

In page 4, subsection (6), line 46, before " a member " to insert " the Chairman or ".

This amendment is designed to set out what the term of office of the chairman is. The term of office of the members is defined as not exceeding four years; the chairman's term is not defined. This exists in regard to other boards. I know one or two where it exists, where the members are appointed for a specific period, but the most important member—when I talk about members I mean ordinary members—is clearly the chairman, because a great deal of the day-to-day work goes through him. He is not appointed for any specific period and, in effect, he is there at the pleasure of the Government, which, to my mind, is unsatisfactory. If a man has no tenure of office his independence may be put in some jeopardy. He should have tenure of office not less favourable than that of members, who in a sense are under him. While it is arguable that the chairman should have a longer term of office, it is undeniable that he should not have a shorter term. The purpose of this amendment is to seek to give him the same security of tenure as the ordinary members of the board. This seems reasonable and I know of no reason why he should not have it.

In the past four years we have had one example of a semi-State board where the chairman was fired by a telephone call five minutes before a meeting started, while the members were not. They served their term of office. Chairmen should not be in any weaker position than ordinary members. If anything, they should be in a stronger position, but I am only arguing here that the chairman of this board should not be worse off in this respect than the ordinary members.

Mr. Keating

I have not very strong feelings on this but it seems to me to be a tautology. If one reads subsection (1) there is a definition of "members.

The members of the Board shall be a chairman and such number (not being more than ten) as the Minister may from time to time determine.

Therefore, the chairman is defined as a member of the board. Mention is not made of a chairman and members. That definition of " member " unequivocally covers the chairman as well as the others. Subsection (6) refers to " the period of office of a member " not " the period of office of a member and the chairman ".

Mr. H. P. Dockrell

Subsection (4) says:

Subject to the provisions of this Act, the chairman of the board shall hold office as chairman on such terms as the Government decides when appointing him.

Assuming he is appointed, the Government say he may be appointed for two or three years.

Mr. O'Malley

Look at subsection (2) which says:

The chairman of the Board shall be appointed from time to time as occasion demands by the Government, on the recommendation of the Minister, and may be removed from office by the Government on the recommendation of the Minister.

The members cannot be removed from office within the period for which they have been appointed. The chairman is treated in a different way all through this section from the members. Subsection (3) says how the chairman shall resign; subsection (8) says how a member shall resign. What is said in relation to the members is repeated in a somewhat different way right through in relation to the chairman.

Major de Valera

The effect of subsection (2), whatever else is in this section, is to make the chairman a tenant at the will of the Government. In other words, he holds office at the will of the Government. Subsection (2) says that the chairman may, on the recommendation of the Minister, be removed from office by the Government. There is no restriction whatsoever as to how, when or under what conditions the Minister may recommend his removal. On the face of that subsection, it is patent that he holds office at the will of the Government. Is that wise?

Mr. Keating

I am bound to say that a real point has been made and I would be disposed to accept the amendment.

Amendment agreed to.

Question proposed: " That section 8, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Mr. O'Malley

Subsection (1) says:

The members of the Board shall be a chairman and such number (not being more than ten) as the Minister may from time to time determine.

I do not want names, because presumably they are not even thought of yet, but could the Minister give us an idea of the type of people involved? Will they all be academics? Will we get people from industry? This Bill is being promoted by the Minister for, and the Department of Industry and Commerce. We spoke at some length on section 4 about the necessity for an industrial bias in these matters. I would not like to see a group of people being taken out of universities and other academic institutions for this board. They might not have the interest or priorities in their own minds about the general industrial, practical technological aspects that are so necessary today. So far as it is possible to give it, could we have a guarantee, for example, that a significant proportion of "not more than 11 people in all" would be industrialists, agriculturalists in the scientific and technological sense, and agri-industrialists and that it would not be totally or even predominantly an academic board?

Mr. Keating

I have no hesitation in giving that guarantee because I completely agree with the Deputy. The core of the problem with science is that it has to be made to permeate the economy with beneficial effects on society. To choose people who were simply academics in terms of efficiency, of practicality and of an understanding of the economy, would be disastrous.

I do not have names. I believe the net now and at all future times should be cast very widely. To the extent that they are academics, they ought to be people with an understanding of life outside university and economic realities. There should be people from industry, agriculture and other sections of the economy. There might be persons who had a lifetime's experience of this sort of communication and inter-relation required for the administrative tasks involved here. We should cast the net very widely because to have academics only would, in my view, prejudice the work of the board.

Chairman

Is it the Minister's intention to use his authority to put the full complement referred to in the Bill on the board?

Mr. Keating

Yes. It has taken a lot of time between various Departments to get this far. I think it is overdue and I would propose to appoint the full complement straight away.

Mr. Halligan

Arising out of what Deputy O'Malley says and thinkinging of the many areas from which one could draw the members of the board, is it a wise restriction to confine it to ten? We have, for example, a strait-jacket at Cabinet level by the constitutional limitation of 15 Ministers.

Mr. O'Malley

If we had not that, we would have 68 of them now.

Chairman

I am all for the confined board because boards that are open-ended may be ineffective due to too many people being on them.

Mr. Halligan

But there are so many aspects of science and technology that should be represented that if you limit yourself you will wind up with some important areas being left out. For example, in the context of the field of engineering, if you take somebody out of the field of engineering, there are now so many specialities in engineering that you could fill the whole ten places with them. We could talk about agriculture——

Mr. O'Malley

Minting and smelting, I think are pretty relevant now.

Mr. Halligan

We agreed earlier that we should not only include the physical sciences but also the social sciences. There must be somebody from the universities but not too many. There must be somebody who comes out of business and perhaps whose only relationship with science and technology is that his products are the result of them and is giving employment. If you begin to think of it in those terms, ten is too few. Heads of various institutes would feel very aggrieved if they were not on it, and rightly so.

Mr. Keating

You might make it too big.

Mr. Halligan

I would not go beyond 20 but I think ten is very restrictive.

Mr. Keating

I have a strong feeling about this. First, about the need for inputs from a number of sectors, ten is however, an OECD recommendation—I would not take that as an over-riding reason for it but it happens that I agree with it. Secondly, where you need so many inputs to cover your needs—I do not think even 20 would cover our needs—it must function through committees. Inputs have to come from all these sectors but through committees.

As regards size I am in favour of about the football team size for the board—certainly not 20. My own belief is that a dozen or a little less is about right because you want a board to knit and be cohesive and when it is bigger than that it breaks into subsections. I am very strongly pursuaded in practice that anything over the 12 is too big for boards to be effective and cohesive. In this case the number is one less than 12—the chairman and ten others. I would not totally set my face against a tiny increase but I would certainly be against even 15, for which I think a precedent was mentioned. I think that is too many.

Mr. H. P. Dockrell

Suppose some new business started up and you wanted to put some person high up in that business on the board, your hands would be tied by this section. You would not be able to make him a member until the specified period runs out.

Major de Valera

Surely, the answer to all this is that if you start on that premises it is not 20, 30 or 100 you would want. This board cannot be approached on the basis of representation: it must be approached on what it is like. I completely agree that it should not be academic and that it is intended to be practical in the sense that academism has been critised. But I also say it should not be too narrow with an industrial bias, because as the Minister has pointed out, much depends on the so-called pure element in the long run. In the famous wartime projects for atomic energy and atomic bombs under the stress of war, it was the scientists who were harnessed and had to be harnessed. They would be in the academic area. We should not be too sensitive on this. I think the test is general personal suitability for the board, and a balance in expertise, knowledge, recognition and experience. I take issue with anybody who would advise that there should be university or business representation because university representation can miss the practical and the business representative—very often businessmen have not a clue about these things although very good businessmen.

Professional men in other professions can be worst of all. This must be a matter of complete integration in selecting the board. I want to emphasise that the long-term purely scientific approach in the broadest sense of science is an element that must be there. During the war—coming back to the Emergency Scientific Research Bureau—the most important and effective practical man on the job in the country with one other, who later became an academic but was in the academic field, was a professor of engineering who had wide mining and practical experience. Anybody can look up the record. I do not like to mention names. The fact that work was done was due to the combination of his knowledge, expertise and the business drive that characterises an engineer who has had real experience in the world.

I think the Minister should strive for a board in that sense and he should take a stand against any idea of representation of interests. It must not be representing any particular interest but selected to do the general advisory work, with members having sufficient knowledge and certain expertise available in themselves to make them competent to be a science board and also a practical board. After that, the whole exercise of appointment should be to get the organ of Government that will be most effective for the development of science both in the long term and in the short term, in the pure sense and not only the applied sense, and with a view to extending the benefits of science to the community where it permeates into every department as we all agreed in our earlier discussion.

Chairman

I should like to intervene to say that we did not decide at the start of the meeting when we should finish. With your permission, I propose to conclude this meeting at 1 o'clock. I find myself in complete agreement with what Deputy de Valera has said about the number. I do not think we are seeking vocational representation on this board in the sense that different institutions in the agricultural and industrial or science fields must be represented per se on the board. I prefer the Minister’s view about the numbers. That is simply one voice here but it is open to the Minister at this stage.

I would make a general comment. We come to a number of sections to which there have not been amendments tabled—the next such section is 13, to which Deputy O'Malley has put down two amendments. The intervening sections are such that we might have a consensus. At our next meeting we could begin with section 13, the next section to which amendments have been tabled.

Mr. Keating

I agree with the sentiments expressed. In regard to the section, my preference would be for a membership of from six to ten. I believe such a board would be effective.

Mr. Gallagher

I agree with the smaller number but I am wondering about the term of office of four years.

Mr. Keating

The four years provision refers to a maximum. It will be a rolling board—a member might resign and be replaced. In practice it would not be a four-year term.

Question put and agreed to.