It is proposed to take item No. 21. By agreement, the Dáil shall sit later than 9 p.m. today and not later than 11.30 p.m., business shall be interrupted at 11 p.m. and Government business shall be taken between 8.30 p.m. and 11 p.m. Private Members' Business shall be item No. 47, motion No. 79.
Order of Business.
Is the late sitting agreed? Agreed. Is it agreed that Government business shall be taken between 8.30 p.m. and 11 p.m.? Agreed.
Will the Taoiseach give some information about the legislation which has just been mentioned by the Minister for Justice?
The Minister has given the information. The heads of the Bill are prepared and the text will be ready shortly. There will be a discussion between the Whips about the time at which it can best be taken in order to clarify the position and deal with the matters raised by Deputy Woods and explained by the Minister.
Does the Taoiseach regard it as a satisfactory way of doing business that on a major matter of this sort we are again faced with the prospect of rushed, hastily considered legislation being bulldozed through this House? Will he seriously consider in regard to this Minister, whom he has already had to remove from the Department of Finance, removing him from the Department of Justice before he does any more harm there?
There are no such proposals. The Deputy recognises, even if he is not prepared to admit it, that the Supreme Court is not under the control of the Government. It makes its decisions at the moment as it chooses. If those decisions call into question a law, the application of which is in the national interest, then, as Deputy Woods urged on Friday, it is desirable that legislative action is taken at once to deal with it. That is how this House proceeded on a number of occasions in the past, whichever Government were in power. The Deputy's attempt to suggest otherwise, to raise extraneous matter or to suggest that this in some way reflects on the Government will carry as little weight as do so many of his comments in this House.
Will the Taoiseach not admit that this is just another instance of the total incompetence of the Government, their failure to get anything right and their continually having to come to this House and appeal to us to bail them out of the mess they are making?
I made it clear, and the Deputy knows perfectly well, a Supreme Court decision is one that requires action. We are taking prompt action, as his side of the House has suggested. The remarks he is making now could be described, I hope not in unparliamentary language, as a lot of wind.
Maybe the Taoiseach can bail out these people. I wish to raise on the Adjournment the compulsory lay-off of 100 Bord na Móna workers in the Oweninney and Bangor Bogs.
I will communicate with Deputy Calleary.
Ba mhaith liom a phlé ar an Athló ceist na mbóithre go ginearálta i nDún na nGall agus ceist na mbóithre contae go speisialta, os rud é go bhfuil an chuid is mó acu san staid nach bhfuil muintir mó dháilcheantair ábalta taisteal ar an bóithre sin.
Beidh mé i dteagmháil leis an Teachta.
I would like to raise on the Adjournment, as a matter of grave and urgent necessity, the question of the preservation of our national monument sites, especially the Derrynaflan site at Lurgoe, Killenaule, County Tipperary, where the grave of the goban saor has been desecrated?
I will communicate with the Deputy.