I move:
That Seanad Éireann regrets the recent refusal of Ministers to attend debates in the Seanad and disagrees with the view of the Government as expressed by the Leader of the House on the 5th August, 1959 (Seanad Debates—Vol. 51, No. 10, Cols. 842/3).
The purpose of this motion is not political or personal. It is rather for the purpose of clarifying a situation that has arisen and it is intended to get a principle and a practice accepted so that in future here in this House we might avoid bickering across the House as to what is or what is not to be discussed. May I say at the outset that I am very glad to see the Taoiseach here and to hear what he has to say on the matter? I have no desire to line Senators up on this matter. I feel that the result of this debate, what the Taoiseach has to say and what we may agree on will affect this Seanad and future Seanaid. I hope it will be for the better.
The present position of this House is that we have a written constitution. We have Rules and Standing Orders, but it should be made clear that that is not sufficient to enable this House or any Parliament to work. Everything is not foreseeable. In effect, this House works on practices, customs and established precedents. It is not always easy to see what the things you write really mean. It is only in the recent discussions on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill that I myself realised the precise implications of the provision in the Constitution of 1922—it is still there and I approve of it—that the Ministers have a right to attend and be heard in both Houses.
If you interpret this with regard to the rights of Ministers, you could have as many as 14 Ministerial speeches on the one Bill which, as Euclid said, is absurd. No Government would try to do it. That illustrates that you have to establish a practice and a practice has been established with regard to Ministerial intervention in this House. It has been the practice, since the House started, for Ministers to come into the House with Bills. The only thing that is wrong with that, perhaps, from the point of view of a person who has sat on Government benches in the House is that it is not good for the Government Party because it gives them in every case a Minister to argue on their side.
I know that the Constitution provides that the Government are responsible to the Dáil but I never suggested —and I do not think anybody would suggest—that the Government could be put out of office by a vote in this House or that, indeed, a Government is bound even to take account of a vote in this House except in the case where we do something with the Bill and the Bill becomes subject to the provisions of the Constitution. The complete falacy, however, in what was said by Senator Ó Maoláin on 5th August, is that because you cannot put Ministers out of office, you cannot ask them questions or cannot criticise them or discuss their administration.
That certainly is not so. The Seanad is an integral part of the Oireachtas. We have limited powers and when a Bill comes here, it may be defeated or amended but it can always be passed over our heads. I should like to recall that the practice here has always been that a Bill brought here is explained in detail, as, indeed, was a Bill this very afternoon in this House. That applies to Money Bills, Finance Bills and Appropriation Bills.
When the Minister for Finance comes in here, he explains in detail everything that is necessary to be explained with regard to finance. All the Minister for Finance I have heard here have answered in detail any questions asked. There was an occasion here, I think, when a Minister endeavoured to argue that he was not obliged to explain the financial provisions of a Bill. I think that before the end of the debate he succeeded in mending his hand on that particular matter. Ministers, therefore, attend on every kind of a Bill and give every possible kind of information.
I come now to the question of administration which is specifically mentioned by Senator Ó Maoláin. Perhaps, I should read what he said. This was on 5th August in an Adjournment debate on the circulation of a pamphlet with regard to Ireland's rôle in the United Nations. Senator Ó Maoláin on 5th August, 1959, Volume 51, Number 10, Column 842, is reported as saying:
The view of the Government regarding the practice which has recently developed in the Seanad, of moving motions of this character on the adjournment, is that it is an attempt to devise a new procedure by which Ministers would be made accountable to the Seanad for their administration. The constitutional position is that Ministers are responsible to the Dáil only—members of the Dáil, of course, being elected directly by the people. Ministers are not responsible to the Seanad.
That, I think, is a misunderstanding of the position. The fact that Ministers are not responsible to the Seanad merely means that a vote of the Seanad, unlike a vote of the Dáil, does not put them out of office. In the Dáil, if the Taoiseach fails to retain the support of the majority, he goes out of office. That does not apply here. But that does not imply that the Taoiseach or Ministers cannot be questioned or that even Government administration cannot be discussed.
The Appropriation Bill contains the salaries or part of the salary of every Minister. It raises questions of administration. Various efforts have been made here—not all of them successful, indeed—to arrange that different Ministers will be present to hear different administrations discussed and to imitate, therefore, the kind of thing you have in the Dáil on the Estimates. That has not been very satisfactory, but the right to discuss administration is there.
The Seanad may annual a statutory instrument and to-day and every day on the Seanad Order Paper, when we meet, there is a list of papers laid on the Table. The normal thing for Bills is that Orders made by the Government—and, after all, that is administration—may be annulled by either House. Senators will recollect that the Government used the Seanad to annul the Solicitors (Remuneration) General Order, 1957, because the time limit was expiring and the Dáil was not sitting. It is quite clear, therefore, that the Seanad may discuss administration.
Perhaps I may be allowed to define in a rough way what I regard as administration. It is a Minister's exercise of his powers under statute or the way he exercises or fails to exercise them in a particular case. It follows, therefore, that when that kind of thing is discussed in the Seanad, Ministers should normally attend. I have gone to the trouble of finding out, for a period, how many questions were raised on the Adjournment. There were, I think, just 30 in a period of 20 years—from 1938 to 1959—which is pretty significant. Some of the matters raised were of great importance and some of minor importance but all of them were questions of administration—the admission of aliens; air-raid precautions; export of seed potatoes; paraffin supplies for rural areas—that was during the war —the depression in the cattle industry; an Ennis company's affairs; transport of turf; price of bread; delay with proposals for the Agricultural Institute; the suspension of Post Office parcel service: that surely is administration. There was a general discussion, at my own instance, which lasted over five hours on a motion on the Adjournment on 4th October, 1939, with the then Taoiseach present.
In all, there are only 30 instances in 20 years, that is, three cases on the Adjournment in every two years. That is not excessive. I think also that the Leader of the House when he was making his statement did not like what was being discussed but you cannot take that as a criterion. The fundamental thing in parliamentary government is that you have to listen to the other fellow saying something you do not like. We all experience that from time to time. Unless one has the patience to do that, one will become irritated. A Minister who has not the patience to do that will, I am afraid, be in a very bad way in a very short time, no matter what Government he may belong to.
We make no claim to make Ministers accountable to the Seanad as they are to the Dáil. We do not advocate a new procedure. I have shown that there are examples from 1922 to 1938 and there are 20 examples between 1938 and 1959. One may ask: "Why do people not put down motions instead of raising matters on the Adjournment?" I have not raised anything on the Adjournment since 1939. I cannot be accused of being very strong on Adjournment proceedings. However, there is no machinery in this House for asking Questions, as there is in the Dáil. Personally, I think it would be quite impracticable. I would not advocate it. When it was talked about some years ago, I was opposed to it. I think it is a burden that should not be placed on Ministers and I think it would not work.
On the other hand, the Question on the Adjournment is much simpler than a motion. It does not lead to a division. Very often, it leads to an immediate discussion. It has the merit of dealing with a specific point since it should not normally be a matter of first-class importance. You may say to me, then: "It should not be abused." I agree. Nothing should be abused. However, the right to follow a particular procedure should not be removed or diluted simply because some people at particular times endeavour to abuse it.
I do not claim that a Minister should come to the Seanad at the time the Seanad wants him or that he should always come when he is asked. I feel Senators should adopt a reasonable attitude in that respect. For instance, I have myself always, when sitting here in the Opposition, adopted a reasonable attitude. When I was on the other side of the House and endeavouring to get Ministers to come here and transact business, I found that my opponents were reasonable with regard to the attendance of Ministers. The other House has a prior claim upon Ministers' time. If a Minister is to come, we can expect to have him only at the moment when he can reasonably come. Whether I was out of office or in office, I always found it worked smoothly. I have found it worked smoothly with different people opposed to me, no matter who was leading the other Party.
It is unwise for Ministers to refuse to come here for motions they dislike because that is not the criterion at all. I think, also, that the more that is done to keep up the reputation and procedure of this House, the better for the Parliament generally—the better for the Dáil, for the Government, for the State and for the whole lot of us—because one of the things you have to combat in every other country as in this country is the notion that politicians and politics generally are not for decent people.
I do not propose to deal with the amendment in the name of Senator Sheehy Skeffington. The amendment gives Senator Sheehy Skeffington the satisfaction of being against all comers. I am prepared to leave him in the comfort of that position without knowing what precisely he intends to say. I am prepared to make a confession. While I was Leader of the House, on one occasion, I advised the then Taoiseach not to attend for a motion set down by Senator Sheehy Skeffington for which there was no seconder and which dealt with illegal military organisations. I gave that advice because I think just a fortnight earlier the then Taoiseach had made a long statement in the Dáil which had met with the approval of the Leader of the Opposition in the Dáil and I felt there was no necessity for him to come here. I said so and in the result, no seconder was found for the motion and a Senator on the Opposition side, Senator Ted O'Sullivan, simply said they were not seconding the motion but they stood by what had been said by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. de Valera. On another occasion, purely on a matter of physical disability, I advised the Minister for Education, General Mulcahy, who had been in the Dáil from 10.30 a.m. until 4.30 p.m., not to come here. He did not take my advice. He insisted upon coming and he made a statement. Those are the only cases I can remember.
Before I conclude, there is one more thing I should like to say. I am not sure whether or not it is really germane to the motion because we are talking about the rights of the Seanad and how Ministers ought to treat us. I suggested here before to the Minister for Finance that more use could properly be made of the Seanad. I should like to put that case to the Taoiseach also. More Bills, except Money Bills, should be introduced in this House. For example, one of the Bills we have here on the Order Paper, the Apprenticeship Bill, could very easily have been introduced here and that would have given certain relief to the Dáil. As we know, the Dáil is cluttered up with much business for two reasons. One is that the financial year runs from April to April instead of from January to December and the other is that the Estimates are discussed in detail in the Dáil. For that reason, just after April, they have to deal with the Budget and the Estimates and whatever Bills they have to transact. That gives them an immense volume of legislation and financial business.
What happens to us? In July or the beginning of August this year, we got several Bills from the Dáil. The Dáil had risen and we had to pass them, whether we liked or not. I am not blaming the Taoiseach: I make him a present of this: I think no Government is worse than another but I would not say that no Government is better than another. They are all pretty bad in that respect. We had to pass Bills this year which involved nearly £20,000,000. I suggest that if Bills were introduced in the Seanad, it would help to remedy that situation and give us more work beginning in October or November, and it would not in any way take from the powers of the Dáil. Under the Constitution, when a Bill goes to the Dáil and is amended in any particular, and is sent back to us, the 90 days begin to run from the day we get it from the Dáil.