There are two amendments and the Chair is proposing that the Seanad take them together.
LONGFORD-WESTMEATH.
Electoral (Amendment) Bill, 1968— Report and Final Stages.
I move amendment No. 1:
In page 11, in the entry relating to Longford-Westmeath to delete "except the part thereof which is comprised in the constituency of Roscommon-Leitrim".
Amendment No. 2 is joined with amendment No. 1. This matter was referred to in Committee yesterday. What is involved is the fact that in the Schedule to the Bill as it stands, it is proposed by the Minister that the west urban district of Athlone be joined to County Roscommon, thereby being separated from the remainder of the urban district.
The Minister in his attempted justification of the scheme of constituencies which he is proposing to us, introduced certain considerations which, in his opinion, so far as he revealed his mind to the Seanad, should be the basis of the drawing up of a system of constituencies for electoral purposes. We have continually, throughout the debate, endeavoured to show up the hollowness of those principles, and to indicate that they are rationalisations rather than rational arguments. Even if this were not so, even if we were prepared to concede that the arguments which the Minister has proposed were compelling rational arguments and were the real reasons why these things were proposed to be done, this would still not justify what is being done in this case.
What is being done here is not called for by the constitutional exigencies of the problem facing the Minister in his task of producing an Electoral Amendment Bill. This partitioning of a single urban district is not called for by any arithmetical exercise which is necessary because of constitutional requirements. On Committee Stage the Minister produced only one argument why it was proper that west Athlone, which is west of the River Shannon, should be taken from the remainder of the urban district and joined with its hinterland. The only ground on which the Minister relies is one of affinity of community. If that is the principle on which the Minister relies, surely there is more affinity between two parts of the one urban district, between Athlone which lies west of the Shannon, and Athlone which lies east of the Shannon, than there is between west Athlone and its hinterland.
In primitive times, in the Middle Ages, in many parts there were split cities. There was a time when Buda and Pest were two quite separate cities. There are now one city. Buda and Pest were joined together and integrated. There was a time when west Athlone was Irishtown. There was a time when people living in Athlone east of the Shannon had no interest in those who lived in the hovels on the western bank. Today Athlone is a unit. It is one urban district. The people of west Athlone have expressed no desire for this change and, if they were consulted on this point, I am sure the people of west Athlone would choose to stick together. I would not be surprised if it did not turn out to be the case that constitutional exigencies did arise, the people of west Athlone would prefer to move as a unit to Roscommon if that were required— though it is not—rather than have the urban district split. The Minister has produced nothing that can pass for an argument in this regard.
As I mentioned last night the Bridge of Athlone still stands. The Minister who is a less heroic figure than Sergeant Custume wants to separate east Athlone from west Athlone. This is probably one of the more grotesque of the elements of the scheme proposed by the Minister. As I mentioned on Committee Stage, our purpose in this debate is to speak our minds and to make it clear that we are not deceived by what is being done. We hope in doing so that the people will not be deceived. As I said before, on this occasion we do not have an appeal to the people who upheld our arguments in the long debates of last year.
In this case the Minister can, by force, win the argument in this House.
Unless the Minister in the freshness of the morning can produce more cogent arguments than he produced at a relatively late hour last night, I personally can do nothing else but come to the conclusion that he has no rational arguments to make in support of the partitioning of the urban district of Athlone, and that it is being done for reasons which the Minister does not wish to give.
(Longford): When the Senator spoke about the western part of Athlone he referred to it as West Athlone. While it is in the constituency of Longford-Westmeath it is in the county of Roscommon. While we heard a lot about county boundaries the Senator did not mention the fact that West Athlone is in Roscommon. We get a picture of prehistoric times but today one part of the town of Athlone is in Roscommon and another part is in Westmeath. The Senator did not mention that simple fact. That is a pity because it puts the matter more clearly. I do not like to suggest that he was trying to hide something. Perhaps he was not fully aware of this.
I should also like to say that in Athlone today there is a natural division, a historic division. There are two dioceses involved. West of the Shannon there is the diocese of Elphin, with a beautiful church. It seems to dominate and hold the bridge just as thoroughly as Sergeant Custume did.
Again, in the diocese of Ardagh-Clonmacnoise you have the eastern part of the town. Let us not forget that diocesan boundaries are things we should take account of. From the topographical point of view, I often feel they are better divisions of this country than county boundaries, with all respect to King John or whoever made those divisions in the first instance. So far as diocesan boundaries are concerned we have in Athlone a part west of the Shannon which is in the diocese of Elphin and east Athlone is in the diocese of Ardagh-Clonmacnoise. There is a certain order which maintains a balance between the two dioceses at the present day. That is a necessary element in the equation. I might also mention that I should like the Seanad to note that even in the present day the people who play Gaelic football associate with Roscommon when it comes to affiliating their clubs, not with Westmeath. These are present day factors that should be taken into account before coming to a final decision on this matter. It would be inaccurate for the Seanad to say that loyalties to county boundaries do not exist at the present time. They do exist. I should like to hear the Minister on that point.
So would we.
(Longford): So far as I know there is quite a bit of rivalry in a town that is straddled across a river, like Carrick-on-Shannon with one part in Roscommon and another in Leitrim. I know the difficulties and stresses and tensions which can arise in a place like Carrick-on-Shannon.
I have very little to say on this except to put the matter right so far as the County Roscommon end of it is concerned. Geographically speaking, Athlone is west of the Shannon. Unfortunately, it is not in County Roscommon. Athlone is in County Westmeath. On the west bank of the Shannon Athlone is for all purposes in Westmeath unless we consider the purpose of the diocese. I do not purport to be an expert on what dioceses are, but I am sure Senator O'Reilly could give us the lowdown on that. I do not wish to get into dispute with one bishop or the other as to whether West Athlone belongs to a particular diocese. There is the question of the GAA as an argument in favour of dividing the town, but it should not be used. It is incorrect to say that part of Athlone west of the Shannon is in Roscommon for GAA purposes. It is far from it. If there is such a thing as a ban in GAA circles in existence——
They cannot go to Trinity College.
There is only one place one goes if he has anything to do with that group of administrators. So far as the west bank of the Shannon is concerned, today people who live in Athlone west of the Shannon feel it would be a crime for its GAA members to play in Roscommon, that is, in the eyes of the GAA. It would not be fair to use these arguments in favour of the Minister's decision. I know that the majority of the people in the town of Athlone—and some regard should be taken of their views in this particular matter—on both sides of the Shannon are in favour of keeping Athlone as one unit. It was put to me by people on both the Leinster and the Connacht sides that they did not care which constituency they were in provided the town was left compact. That is a very sensible and reasonable line of approach.
I do not know whether the Minister has received a protest or any communication from the chamber of commerce or other groups, but at meetings they have strongly condemned this proposed division of the town. I urge the Minister at this stage to have another look at this. He would be doing a better job if he left Athlone intact and brought it fully into Roscommon, or left it in the Westmeath constituency. This is, to my knowledge, the first time ever the town was divided in this fashion. For years Athlone and South Roscommon were part of a constituency. At that time County Roscommon was divided. Whatever justification there may be for dividing a county, there is no justification for dividing a town if it can be avoided and if a better result is given by not dividing it. The Minister would do a better job if he left the town intact. There is a suggestion that this division is proposed in order to suit the Government Party but I do not know whether that would work out in practice. It is said by many people that the Minister for Education would be suited by giving him a good portion of the town of Athlone in case he is weak in the rest of the county.
He did all right up to this.
A lot of Roscommon has been taken from the Galway constituency.
My view is that the area which is coming in could be the Achilles heel for the Minister for Education. The advantage to the Minister could be very slight indeed. If you want to be fair to the Minister and ensure there is no danger to him politically, I think the entire town of Athlone should be brought across the Shannon and then they would be quite sure he would have at least a fair chance of being returned.
Now that the GAA and the dioceses have been mentioned, perhaps at this stage it might be no harm to say a word or two on this issue of dividing the town.
Dividing the town of Athlone.
Dividing Athlone, which I presume is a town. Not alone does the Shannon divide two counties at Athlone. It also divides two provinces, Leinster from Connacht. In my own constituency you have a situation where Drogheda, which is a corporation, is divided by the Boyne. It is a great pity that the Minister did not see fit to take over that portion of Meath which is in Drogheda Corporation area.
That matter does not arise on this amendment.
With regard to the GAA, I should like to point out that the corporation area of Drogheda is under the jurisdiction of the Louth County Board, just as the urban area of Athlone is under the jurisdiction of Westmeath County Board. It can be seen that in the case of Athlone the GAA have a much wiser way of dealing with the situation so far as concerns those particular counties than the Minister had when he drew up this Bill.
The suggestion of Senator O'Reilly that we recognise diocesan boundaries and forget about King John's county boundaries would not, I think, appeal to the Minister. If it did we would have even more straggly constituencies in Senator O'Reilly's Bill than in the Minister's Bill.
One point that strikes me about every amendment the Opposition put down, either here or in the Dáil, is the tendency to increase the disparity in population per Deputy as between different constituencies. It is in marked contrast to their attitude during the debate on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill which proposed to permit a somewhat greater disparity in regard to population per Deputy in order to take account of such considerations as administrative boundaries. Having succeeded in ensuring that practically no scope would be available to take account of those things——
A lot of scope for gerrymandering.
——the Opposition put down in the Dáil and Seanad a series of amendments, all of which were designed to increase the disparity which exists under the Bill. This, of course, is typical of the inconsistency and insincerity of Fine Gael. This amendment would have the same effect. The disparity under the Bill between populations per Deputy in Longford-Westmeath and Roscommon-Leitrim is 1,004.
The effect of this amendment would be to increase this to 1,343. In addition to that, the recognition of the boundary of the Shannon in this case adds to the total population of the west, that is the province of Connaght, and the counties of Clare and Donegal, an extra population of 4,024. This results in raising the total population there from 584,096 to 588,120, increasing the population per Deputy for the 30 Deputies it is possible to allocate to that area by this addition of population of Athlone West Urban Area from 19,469 to 19,604. The Opposition have argued for months on end that democracy requires exact equality of population per Deputy as between one constituency and another.
On a point of order, is the Minister entitled to misquote the Opposition continually? If the Minister wishes to state we have ever pleaded for exact uniformity of representation he should give specific quotations.
Not alone was the whole debate on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill in the Dáil, in the Seanad and before the country based on this principle——
Quotation.
In addition to that, this whole matter arose originally because of the official action taken by the Fine Gael Party in the courts to establish the principle that the only consideration in revising constituencies should be to aim at exact equality of population per Deputy.
The Minister has been asked to give references.
I have not purported to quote any particular Senator or Deputy. There is no need for me to give an exact reference, but if any Senator in the Fine Gael or Labour Party will look up his own contribution to the debate on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill he will see that is the gist of his own argument.
Never. One quotation.
This applies to Senator Dooge, Senator FitzGerald, Senator Rooney and Senator Quinlan.
On a point of order, may I state here and now that I have never argued in this House or in the country for exact uniformity of representation?
May I make the same point and ask the Minister to withdraw the allegation?
I have had the experience of sitting here for hours on end listening to Senators Dooge and FitzGerald making those exact points.
On a point of order, is the Minister entitled to make allegations about speeches in the Dáil and Seanad when he is refusing to give references?
I have not purported to quote from any speech whatsoever but I maintain that the whole trend of the debate in this House and in the Dáil has been on these lines.
On a point of order, as the Minister has suggested that Senators look at their own speeches in the debate on the Third Amendment to the Constitution Bill— and he specifically mentioned Senator Dooge and myself—we are entitled to ask where we made such references because we deny them.
In every contribution which the Senators made, on Second, Committee or Report Stages they argued on these lines which was, in fact, consistent with the Fine Gael official attitude originally.
On a separate point of order, it has been stated here repeatedly on behalf of the Fine Gael Party that no action was ever taken in the Courts on their behalf. The Minister has purported to say that the word "exact" was used. We take exception to the Minister fastening on this word and putting it into our mouths. We ask the Chair for a ruling on this point.
(Longford): An individual could not afford to bring the action.
The action was taken in the courts by a Fine Gael Senator. A Fine Gael Deputy was solicitor, a Fine Gael Deputy was senior counsel and a Fine Gael Senator was junior counsel.
The Minister has not quoted from any precise document. If he quotes from any precise document he must give a reference.
He has been quoting from the Seanad debate.
The Senator has an opportunity to refute the Minister if he wishes, but the Chair sees no occasion for the withdrawal by the Minister of anything he has said so far. The Minister to continue.
As I was pointing out, this amendment like all the other amendments is designed to increase the disparity in population per Deputy. Senator McQuillan suggested that it would be more appropriate to transfer the whole town of Athlone to the Roscommon-Leitrim constituency rather than the Athlone West Urban Area. The fact of the matter is that the Longford-Westmeath constituency could not stand the transfer of the Athlone East Urban Area in addition to the Athlone West Urban Area. This would reduce the population to 72,266 and that would reduce the population per Deputy to 18,066 which would be less than is permissible in accordance with the legal interpretation of the Constitution.
It is not, of course, correct to say that the two parts of the present town of Athlone have always been the same town. Prior to the making of the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898 that part of Athlone which is west of the Shannon was officially as well as it still is physically in the County of Roscommon. It was brought into Westmeath by an Order made under the Local Government (Ireland) Act, 1898, an Act which was passed, of course, by the British Government, and in that respect no less a person than Deputy Dillon was very vocal in protest about what this same Act did in regard to another town on the borders of Roscommon, the town of Ballaghaderreen, which he maintained should never have been taken out of County Mayo and should be put back.
It was the same type of operation that took what is now the Athlone West Urban Area and transferred it to the County of Westmeath and the province of Leinster across the River Shannon. This part of Athlone town is, as has been pointed out, a separate parish in a separate diocese, but it is physically and from the point of view of business associated with the hinterland of South Roscommon, and there is nothing anomalous in including it in the constituency of Roscommon-Leitrim, particularly when by so doing we are tending to comply more accurately with the requirements of the Constitution. It helps to justify the allocation of these 30 seats to the western area and lessens the disparity in population per Deputy as between the two areas.
I want to assure Senator Fitzgerald from Meath that what we are proposing in this Bill will not affect the GAA in any way. Senator Fitzgerald pointed out that the GAA have a wiser way of dealing with these matters. That may be so, but the point of the matter is that the GAA do not happen to be bound by the rigid rule of the Constitution as interpreted by the courts at the behest of the Fine Gael Party. The GAA do not have to operate a rule such as this rule of rigid adherence to near equality of population per Deputy. They do not have to allocate club areas on the basis of a definite population per team, and so they are able, as Senator Fitzgerald says, to regulate their affairs in what he describes as a wiser way. Certainly there is scope allowed to them and I am not aware that there have been any great complaints about the operation of such scope, but the combined Opposition have succeeded in ensuring that the Oireachtas will not be permitted to exercise a very small amount of scope in order to take account of these practical considerations such as administrative boundaries.
The amount of scope that was requested from the people was very much less than is available in every other known democracy and in our opinion it did not involve any breach of any democratic principle. As I pointed out yesterday, I believe that it would be much more democratic to leave constituencies such as Cavan and Monaghan and indeed Roscommon and Leitrim and so on confined within their own county boundaries even if there was some fairly considerable disparity in the ratio of population per Deputy as between one constituency and the other so long as there was no substantial pattern of discrimination as between one area and another.
Of course it was provided in the Bill that this could not in fact be done, but the result of the activities of the Opposition Parties in regard to the Third Amendment of the Constitution proposal is that we are bound by this rigid requirement of the Constitution, and I am satisfied that the proposals in the Bill as a whole, and in particular this proposal, are the most reasonable way of complying with the terms of the Constitution as interpreted by the courts at the behest of the Fine Gael Party and as endorsed by the people in the recent referendum.
It is fascinating to watch the way in which what started as a three card trick is becoming a four and a five card trick as a card disappears from place to place. We started off with maintaining county boundaries, but that was dropped in favour of maintaining constituency boundaries. We now have a proposal which involves abandoning both the county boundaries and the constituency boundaries and we hear now that we are to have regard to diocesan boundaries. This was a very interesting proposal. I do not know whether the Senator who put it forward is familiar with the diocesan map of Ireland. Certainly in the West of Ireland it is a remarkable map and it would give rise to considerable difficulties if we were to maintain it. The Archdiocese of Tuam is a relatively recent diocese as is Galway, which is not, of course, in the Protestant grouping of dioceses because it is so recent, or Kilmacduagh and Kilfenora, of one of which the Pope is indirectly bishop —they pray for the Pope rather than for a bishop. Certainly the boundaries there are extremely complex, involving little bits of Clare and Galway isolated from each other, and if we are to have regard to these diocesan boundaries it will be extremely difficult indeed to get coherent representation, and I do not think it is a principle which we should pursue too far. The suggestion of dividing constituencies having regard to football teams is an interesting proposal and, unfortunately, one which anyone with local knowledge of the area will accept would cause less disturbance than the changes proposed by the Minister.
The Minister speaks of the maximum tolerance allowed by the Constitution and as interpreted by the courts and he makes the old allegation that Fine Gael were responsible for the decision of the Supreme Court. We have no control over the Supreme Court; it is not we who appoint the judges and, generally speaking, these judges are not supporters of our Party. Therefore, I do not think it behoves any Minister to make this allegation. The decision to go to the Supreme Court in the first instance was taken by Senator John O'Donovan who acted on his own initiative.
That is the joke of the year.
I was not a member of Fine Gael at that time but I must say that I supported Senator O'Donovan's action and I was very much in favour of it. I was delighted that he disregarded the Party line on that occasion and went ahead on his own. When that Bill was published, I remember somebody handing it to me and, having just glanced over it, I knew it was obviously unconstitutional and, consequently, I was very pleased when, within a short period, Senator O'Donovan took the necessary action. However, to describe this as official Fine Gael action is total nonsense as the Minister well knows. It was done against the wishes of the Fine Gael Party at that time for reasons of which I am not aware as I was not then a member of the Party.
The fact is that the tolerance allowed is five per cent but we do not know what the five per cent is. We do know that one-sixth is too much because in the 1959 Bill one-sixth was ruled out by the High Court. We know, too, that one-twentieth is permissible because the Supreme Court so ruled in 1961. May be a high tolerance is permitted but we should not push our luck too far in that regard and, for the moment, we must accept the five per cent limit.
Within the five per cent limit, there is no need for the changes proposed by the Minister. The tolerance of five per cent which is allowed by the Constitution and as interpreted by the Supreme Court, is sufficient to enable us to leave existing county and constituency boundaries as they are. One of the Senators on the other side of the House said that the county boundary was such as to make West Athlone come in with Roscommon. If the Senator who made that point had read the Bill he would have seen the specific reference to that, which is as follows:
in the administrative County of Westmeath, the district electoral division of Athlone West Urban.
This is a county boundary which, if I understood the Minister correctly, has been there since before the foundation of the State. The Minister is now breaching the county boundary contrary to the principles enunciated in the referendum and contrary to both the principles enunciated by him yesterday.
This Bill is a gerrymander designed to achieve the particular political objectives desired by the Minister, but whether it will achieve them is another matter. Clearly, the immediate effect of it is on the one hand to improve the position of the Minister for Education in Roscommon, and on the other hand it will presumably not disturb the balance in Longford-Westmeath. It is a carefully calculated piece of gerrymandering. It may not be well calculated. This attempt to gerrymander may well rebound on those responsible and on those who initiated it for Party political expediency.
The Minister has claimed that we, on this side of the House, support the principle of exact arithmetical equality throughout the country but this is untrue. We supported the constituencies which the Minister and other Members of his Government have been undermining in Bill after Bill during the past 20 years and which, in some cases, have been overruled by the High Court and the Supreme Court. We support the Constitution and we have never attempted to achieve stringent interpretation. I, in fact, put forward a scheme to the Minister in one of my amendments which would involve a tolerance of eight per cent. We felt we could take a chance on the eight per cent because we believed that the Supreme Court in allowing five per cent did not say it should be only five.
I do not know how any Minister could have the face to come in here and say that we sought exact arithmetical equality. I do not believe that any other Minister would have had the face to make such a blatantly untrue statement as that. The Minister has even refused to give authority to the statements in the debates of the House.
All during this debate and since the Bill was first brought before the Seanad, and particularly on this Stage, cries of injured innocence have pervaded the Fine Gael speeches. Senator FitzGerald, who is no novice at this game, in fact he is quite an adroit juggler with words and facts, puts on this air of simplicity as well as any stage personality I know.
Senator FitzGerald and the other members of the Fine Gael Party should drop this nonsense. They are not speaking now to members of a Fine Gael branch. They are not speaking now to members of a small assembly at a crossroads who might not know the difference. They are speaking to a House of intelligent people who can see through the trickery that has gone on, not only in connection with this Bill but in connection with many other measures which the Government brought in for the benefit of the people. This air of unctuous hypocrisy and injured innocence gets on my nerves. One would imagine that all the wisdom of the ages was on that side of the House and that the people who framed these Bills, and framed this Bill, knew absolutely nothing but had to wait until the genius of Fine Gael, as exemplified by Senator FitzGerald, made itself manifest in providing a just solution for all problems. They refuse to give any credit to anyone except the Fine Gael Party for putting forward any proposals.
I gave credit to two previous Taoiseachs for not gerrymandering as much as is being done this time.
Every time they make a statement or move an amendment in Committee or make a Second Reading speech it is to the effect: "We say this, we say this, we say this, and we know the answers to everything". For one moment they do not admit that they do not know everything, and for one moment they do not admit that the Government must know something, and must have some intelligence. Their whole attitude is: "If you do not accept our amendments; if you do not accept our theories which we put forward in Second Reading speeches you are not acting correctly. You are not acting in the interests of our people. You are attempting to do something which is wrong".
Surely at some point, at some time, in some Bill, the Government must be right. To judge from Senator Garret FitzGerald and his carry-on here for as long as he has been in the House, the Government are never right. They have the solution to everything and the Government have the solution to nothing. Another very adroit system is to get away from the point——
Which the Senator is now doing.
——as they did in relation to the diocesan boundaries. The Minister made no suggestion about basing the electoral constituencies on diocescan boundaries. That suggestion was made en passant by Senator O'Reilly, and Senator FitzGerald immediately fastened on to it to try to create more confusion in the minds of the people who might read it in the newspapers, if the newspapers see fit to publish it.
It was not my idea.
He did not make a suggestion. He merely adverted to it.
The Minister used it.
Senator FitzGerald knows very well that if the Fine Gael Party have ideas along that line, the Fianna Fáil Party do not subscribe to anything of that sort and never did. Senator FitzGerald should know very well that this attempt to sidetrack the issue in regard to the boundaries created by this Electoral Bill will not deceive anyone.
The town of Athlone over which so many salt tears are now being wept, and the putting of portion of it into County Roscommon, is completely enmeshed in statistical arguments and historic precedences, oblivious of the fact that portion of Athlone has always been the county town for South Roscommon, and that it was put into the constituency of Longford-Westmeath by a British Act of Parliament. It had no historic tradition in the county of Westmeath.
I cannot understand for a moment why the Fine Gael Party will not realise that, so long as they continue to use arguments such as they used on this Bill, so long will they remain a source of amusement to any intelligent observer of the political scene in Ireland. This continuous talk of gerrymandering, this continuous talk of fixing the constituencies to suit the Government in power, and this mean mentality as expressed by a couple of Senators on the opposite side about benefits to Ministers resulting from the allocation of territory in this proposal, are certainly not very conductive to standards of high debate in this House.
I wish the Fine Gael Party would attempt to do something to improve that situation which they seem to tolerate with great glee. There is no doubt in the world that this use of the word "gerrymander" is a deliberate attempt to make the people believe that there is something wrong in this Bill. When the referendum proposals were put before the people last October they were told definitely and unequivocally by the Fianna Fáil Party and Government what would be the necessary corollary if the proposals were defeated.
This Bill was produced as being the best possible scheme which would create the least possible disturbance and upset. This Bill has met with favourable consideration by the Fine Gael Party and the Labour Party in the Dáil, as witnessed by the fact that no really determined effort was made to defeat it, and no really determined effort was made to breach it, except that in the last ultimate stage a series of amendments was put down to put up token resistance to it.
No one believes that Fine Gael are serious. No one believes that they really want to put an end to the proposals in this Bill, because the proposals they put up themselves are as absurd as many of the other proposals they put up here during the discussion on various Bills in the previous session, and particularly on the Marts Bill. the sooner Fine Gael realise that there must be some sort of honesty in public life, and that the capitalisation of words which have proved to be effective propaganda in other parts of the country should be ended so far as politicians in this part of Ireland are concerned, the better.
Fine Gael should turn their attention to that in the days to come. If they do not, they will find themselves in the same position in which they find themselves by their lack of belief in their own ability to get anywhere either under this Bill, under PR, or under the straight vote. There is no doubt in the world that so long as they believe that, they will not get anywhere. These amendments which were put down to restore Athlone as one unit, were put down patently for the purpose of creating another red herring across the trail of intelligent discussion, and I have no doubt that the Seanad will reject them.
(Longford): Senator FitzGerald——
On a point of order, are we not on Report Stage?
We are. A second speech is not permitted.
(Longford): Whether it is a point of order or not I want to refer——
I will permit the Senator to make a short explanation on some point but he cannot make a speech.
(Longford): I would have raised a point of order were it not for the fact that I would have been cutting across Senator Ó Maoláin who had not intervened.
Does the Senator wish to make a statement?
(Longford): I want to draw attention to the fact that Senator FitzGerald suggested wrongly that because I referred to the diocesan boundary at Athlone, I was in a general way advocating diocesan boundaries as being valid outlines for constituencies. I was misrepresented by Senator FitzGerald. I said nothing which would leave itself open to the interpretation which Senator FitzGerald seems to want to put on what I said.
That completes the Senator's statement.
He invented the whole thing.
(Longford): I have been misrepresented by better men than him.
It would be a pity if we found ourselves in the position as indicated by Senator O'Reilly who feels obliged to protest in this regard. It would be a pity if the use of irony had to be banished from debates in this House because it was not appreciated. Anyone listening seriously to Senator Garret FitzGerald's tour de force, in which he ended up——
It was a definite, deliberate, false allegation and typical of the Senator.
Senator Dooge to continue without interruption.
Anyone who listened to this tour de force with an open and honest mind could not but realise that it was an ironical statement which was designed to poke fun at the lack of argument which was forthcoming from the far side of the House in this particular regard. Anyone who reads what is there in the Official Report will appreciate that Senator Garret FitzGerald's suggestion that Senator O'Reilly was proposing a disposition of the constituencies on a diocesan basis could not possibly, even in cold print, be interpreted in anything but an ironical manner.
Debate in this House or in any other House would be distinctly the poorer if we say of it that we cannot use irony, and that we cannot talk in this fashion. It was a fair point to make in the debate. It was fair to say that the contributions made from the far side of the House showed a distinct lack of argument.
What were the other points which Senator O'Reilly made? The first point was that I had been wrong and that I had made a mistake—that I had talked of removing the western urban part of Athlone from Westmeath and putting it into Roscommon. That is not so. If Senator O'Reilly had read my amendments before rising to speak on this he would have known that on the authority of the Schedule of the Bill itself I was right in this respect because we see in amendment No. 2 the words "and in the administrative county of Westmeath, the district electoral division of Athlone West Urban". On this point, I was right and Senator O'Reilly was wrong.
(Longford): The administrative county was not what I mentioned. I referred to the Minister and he was aware of the transfer of Ballaghaderreen. I think the Minister was wrong. I think that was carried out in 1899 and not in 1898.
May I come to the defence of the Minister on this? The Act was passed in 1898. The Senator is aware of that.
Senator Dooge to continue.
When we discuss an Electoral Bill and seek to amend the Schedule to it and refer to a county we can only be referring to administrative counties. We are dealing with administrative areas. This is no attempt to cover anything. The whole debate was concerned with the splitting, not only of administrative counties, but of an administrative urban district. In this respect Senator O'Reilly is 70 years out of date. Senator O'Reilly is so quick to find people wrong in their statements that he finds his own Minister wrong. He accuses his own Minister of a statement he never made. He was not only misunderstanding the Minister's statement. The Minister said this was done under the Act of 1898 but never suggested it was done in 1898.
We are dealing here with administrative counties. We are dealing with the transfer, which we hold to be unnecessary, across the boundary of an administrative county. We are dealing with the splitting of an urban district. There is only one argument relevant to this amendment and it is the only argument that can possibly be used. It was used by the Minister, it was used by Senator Ó Maoláin and it was relevant to the amendment, that is the argument that there is a greater affinity between the electoral division of Athlone and the hinterland in Roscommon than between West Athlone and the remainder of the urban district on the eastern side of the Shannon. This is the net point. When Senator Ó Maoláin says this change is something the people were warned about in the referendum campaign, this is not a straight argument and is not the kind of high-minded debate Senator Ó Maoláin appears to appealing for.
If he reflects for a moment he must realise that the matter we are concerned about in this amendment, the matter of the disposition of West Athlone, is something which is not required by constitutional provisions and which does not arise from the decision of the people in the last referendum. In his enthusiasm on this point Senator Ó Maoláin has misdirected himself. It is agreed by anybody who thinks about the thing and examines the position that what the Minister proposes is constitutional. What is proposed in the amendment is constitutional. There is no question that the decision of the people to hold to the pre-existing constitutional provisions in regard to this matter has anything to do with what we are talking about here. Senator Ó Maoláin is quick to accuse us on this side of the House of avoiding the point. The point in this debate is whether West Athlone votes with the remainder of its urban district or with South Roscommon. The record of this Report Stage debate will show clearly which side of the House avoided the point during the debate.
In his contribution, Senator Ó Maoláin, perhaps roused by one or two things that had been said, accused us on this side of the House of never giving any credit to the Government; of never seeing any merit in Bills and of feeling that there is a monopoly of wisdom on this side of the House. I think on reflection he will agree that in this he is being unfair. In the same way as Ministers frequently come into this House and accept amendments from the Opposition benches which are put forward in an honest endeavour to improve legislation, so we accept Bills brought into this House which we believe are well-conceived and for the public good. We therefore allow these Bills to pass, commenting on certain points in regard to them, but accepting for the most part that the Minister has done a good job. Very often, when we produce amendments in this House, the Minister produces an argument pointing out that there are difficulties in regard to the argument. We are not slow to see the merits of these arguments; we are not slow to withdraw our amendments in the face of reasoned argument. We do not claim a monopoly of wisdom. We try to do our job here as an Opposition and try to do our job and improve legislation as it passes through the Seanad. We are in a different position from the Members on the other side of the House, our predisposition is to find fault with legislation —you might say our job is to find fault with legislation—whereas Senator Mullins and his colleagues on the other side of the House have a predisposition to believe the Minister right. This is natural and as it should be. We on this side of the House believe that many Bills that go through here could be improved. We believe that many amendments which we put forward, which the Minister rejects, and on which we are voted down by the power of the Government majority in this House, are amendments which would have made the Bills better.
I think this House works well, because except in moments of irritation both sides of this House think well of one another and have respect for one another's views. It is unfortunate that this debate should have taken a particular turn.
As regards the appeal for honesty in public life. I want to assure Senator Mullins on behalf of those who have taken part in this debate this morning, and who have been attacked, Senator FitzGerald and myself, we do our best, as we see fit, to promote honesty in public life. But, quite frankly, we did not get much encouragement here this morning when the Minister rose to reply to the case which was made for this particular pair of amendments. The Minister started to reply by putting into the mouths of Senator FitzGerald and myself things which we never said. He charged us with saying that we believed in exact representation. This may be fair tactics. The Minister felt he was short of arguments in answering the case that had been made, perhaps then this is legitimate, but it did not end at this. When Senator FitzGerald and I solemnly assured the House that we had never used this argument, the Minister repeated his charge. This was something different; this was something more serious; this was something more than using a quasi-relevant argument in debate; this was calling Senator FitzGerald and myself liars in regard to this particular point. The Minister persisted in this matter and when he did so he certainly was not contributing to honesty in debate in this House. It has been my approach to public life in this House and in politics throughout the country, and I know from personal knowledge that it is also the approach of Senator FitzGerald, that the only way we want to partake in politics is to achieve our own political ideas by honest means. It may be by taking this approach that in the Irish politics of today, it means we fight with one hand behind our back. We have been accused this morning, in fact the Minister repeated statements in this regard, of lying when it suits us in political debate. I agree with Senator Mullins that we need honesty in public life in this country, but sometimes honesty does not seem to pay. I mention these points because they are points which were raised in the debate in this particular regard.
In proposing the amendments I indicated that the Minister on Committee Stage last night gave no argument which could be considered rational in regard to this particular point. This morning he again returned to the question of the hinterland of South Roscommon and produced the quite unnecessary argument that it gave an additional justification for giving a certain number of seats to the West of Ireland, a justification which is not required at all because in spite of what the Minister has continually asserted, there is no need for exact representation; there is only need to remain within the limits of the requirements of the Constitution. To my mind no case has been made for the partitioning of the town of Athlone in this particular way. Senator McQuillan has told us that the people of Athlone would prefer to be united no matter where they are, and I think this is a sensible decision on their part. No case has been made for this particular operation and, accordingly, in this instance, I see no need to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment put.
Na Seanadóiri atá ar thaobh an leasú——
Senators Dooge, Garret FitzGerald, McDonald, Miss Davidson and J. Fitzgerald rose.
Since there are only five Senators their names will be recorded as dissenting.
Amendment declared lost.
I thought it was only the Dáil which could not have a vote before teatime.
Amendment No. 2 not moved.
Bill received for final consideration.
Question proposed: "That the Bill do now pass".
In view of the last statement of Senator Dooge I think I should reply to the effect that the whole debate on this Bill both in the Dáil and here in the Seanad demonstrates the consistent approach of the Opposition to every measure introduced. Their whole attitude is obviously based on the predetermined attitude of opposition on the ground that these are Fianna Fáil proposals and therefore must be opposed. The opposition in both Houses of the Oireachtas to this Bill was obviously bogus opposition. There was no real discontent or disagreement with the principles of the Bill but it was decided as a matter of tactics to represent it as being gerrymandering. In order to adhere to the brief they were given, Opposition spokesmen found it necessary to descend to such things as the false attack, or the attack based on a completely false allegation, that Senator FitzGerald made on Senator O'Reilly, which was typical of the whole insincerity, unscrupulousness, and deliberate duplicity which Senator FitzGerald found it necessary to resort to in order to appear to be seriously dissatisfied with the Bill. In fact the position is, as Senators know, that personal satisfaction and dissatisfaction are roughly equally divided as between Government Deputies and Opposition Deputies. I have had almost as many approaches in regard to the provisions of the Bill from Opposition Deputies as I have had from members of my own Party and there have been at least as many expressions of personal satisfaction with the position in their own areas from the Opposition side as from the Fianna Fáil side. I know that there are at least as many Fianna Fáil Deputies dissatisfied with the proposals as there are Opposition.
On a point of order, is the Minister replying to the debate?
The Minister, as far as the Chair is concerned, is concluding.
We have not had a chance to speak on this Stage.
The Senator had his opportunity but no Senator offered and I then called on the Minister.
It did not occur to me that there would be a debate.
The Chair gave an opportunity. I looked carefully to see if some Member would offer but nobody offered to speak, therefore I had no option but to allow the Minister, if he wished to speak, to conclude.
On this point of order, it is the custom in this House either to take the Final Stage without a debate or if there is a debate on the Final Stage the Minister will reply to the points raised.
The Chair endeavoured to attract the attention of the Opposition particularly. If anyone wished to speak they had their opportunity but nobody offered.
In that case you, Sir, have an opportunity of appreciating that the rules ensure that the Minister in concluding on the Fifth Stage speaks only on what is in the Bill and does not in fact make a concluding speech on Report Stage.
I suggest that the Minister replies to the points raised on the Fifth Stage, which are nil.
The Chair is watching that matter. The Minister to conclude on the contents of the Bill.
I have said that the provisions of the Bill or something very similar to them were the inevitable result of the decision made by the people in the referendum on the Third Amendment of the Constitution Bill, and everything that has happened during the debate in this House tends to substantiate that. It is even demonstrated in the amendments put down by the Opposition.
On a point of order, Sir, is it in order for the Minister to refer to amendments at this stage?
The Chair would call on the Minister to deal with the contents of the Bill.
As I have said, the proposals in the Bill are a direct outcome of the decision made by the people on the Third Amendment.
Is it in order for the Minister to refer to the reasons for the provisions in the Bill?
The Minister to conclude without interruption.
Even the efforts made to minimise the total transfer of population from one county to another resulted in such an obviously more objectionable scheme of constituencies that this substantiates what I said about similar objectionable things having to be done in the Bill that these were the inevitable outcome of the decision made at the behest of the Opposition in regard to the Third Amendment.
Question put and agreed to.