asked the Taoiseach if the changes in the Constitution and legislation concerning divorce and contraception and the modification of the arrangements in national schools to provide interdenominational education suggested by the Minister for Foreign Affairs at a meeting of the Dublin South-East Constituency Executive of Fine Gael on 28th April, 1976, represent Government policy; and if the appropriate legislation and other action to implement them will be taken by the Government and, if so, when.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Constitutional Changes.
1.
The Minister was expressing his personal views on that occasion. There are no proposals for legislation on these matters.
Does the Taoiseach agree with the view put forward by the Minister for Foreign Affairs that where parents express a preference for interdenominational or nondenominational education for their children the State has a duty to meet their wishes?
I informed the Deputy that the Minister was expressing his own views and that it is not proposed to introduce legislation.
Does the Taoiseach agree with the statement to the effect that in these circumstances the State has a duty to meet the wishes of parents?
That is a separate question.
If that is the case I will ask another separate question. Does the Taoiseach accept, as the Minister for Foreign Affairs has stated, that one of the steps that needs to be taken in the reasonably near future in order to protect and advance the rights and privileges of individuals and groups in our society is the repeal of the Article in the Constitution forbidding legislation for the dissolution of marriage? Does he agree with that contention?
Those were his own views and there are no proposals for legislation on them.
Does the Taoiseach approve of the contention of the Minister that the law on contraception should be reformed, removing the ban on the sale of non-abortifacient contraceptives? This is an important subject the Minister was dealing with. Would the Taoiseach indicate whether he accepts the views of the Minister on that subject?
I think the Leader of the Opposition is aware of my views.
May I ask the Taoiseach if he accepts that far from promoting rational debate on these issues, which apparently these statements were intended to do, statements made by individual members of the Government on these fundamental matters, on which the country is looking to the Government for a lead, tend rather to create confusion in the public mind?
It creates much less confusion than the expressed attitude of some of the Deputy's colleagues who were in Government and who accept responsibility for initiating the Provisional IRA.
This is another diversionary tactic as I suspect that is what is happening now in regard to the Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Posts and Telegraphs is to divert attention from the inept handling by the Government of the present economic situation, and may I suggest to the Taoiseach that members of the Government have done violence to the concept of collective responsibility by speaking in divers' tongues and indeed voting with divers' feet on matters of fundamental importance to the people?
Nothing like the violence that was done when Deputies opposite and Ministers accepted responsibility for initiating the Provisional IRA, and it has never been repudiated. Again this week on a television programme it was repeated by an ex-Minister who said other Ministers were involved as well.
What steps does the Taoiseach intend to take in relation to Deputy Thornley? He is still sitting on the Government benches.
Steps were taken to deal with him.
The Deputy is getting away from the question.
In view of the growing support for some modified reform in the areas to which I have referred and in the light of statements made by Opposition spokesmen on these matters, including myself, will the Taoiseach initiate discussion within the Cabinet on these matters and come forward with some agreed form of Government policy?
No. Perhaps the Deputy would say which side he is on on this.
I have expressed my views in this House and outside it.
Next question. I have allowed something like a debate on this one.
May I ask the Taoiseach whether the statements attributed to the Minister for Foreign Affairs are the views of the Government and the Taoiseach and if the Taoiseach does not consider that this chopping and changing in regard to a proposed amendment of the Constitution is entirely the wrong approach, that what we want in new circumstances is a new Constitution——
I could agree with Deputy Blaney's suggestion that in new circumstances a new Constitution would be an appropriate thing. In so far as the speech of the Minister for Foreign Affairs is concerned, he made it clear he was expressing his own views, and it is not Government policy.
When he was in Opposition the Taoiseach was cribbing about me making statements much less serious——
The Deputy can hardly expect me to reconcile Deputy Lynch's views and his views.
It is not a question of reconciling my views.
The people of the country expect the views of the Taoiseach and his Ministers to be reconcilable.
I do not think Fianna Fáil Deputies should talk about reconciling views when even their actions could not be reconciled.