I move:
That Seanad Éireann calls on the Government to carry out an urgent review of the powers and functions of the Seanad and the methods of election of its members.
I welcome the opportunity to debate this motion because the Seanad has in recent times become more and more the object of public scrutiny, press scrutiny and party political scrutiny and particularly the object of the scrutiny of one party who has called for its abolition. These calls have intensified. This scrutiny is welcome because it is right that we as Senators should be able to justify ourselves and our existence to the public.
I have no hesitation in saying that the popularity and image of the Seanad outside these walls is not a good one. That may be our fault, it may be the fault of the press, it may be the fault of the political parties, but there is no doubt that the public perception of the Seanad is undoubtedly that it is a cosy club and is probably, to a degree, a waste of taxpayers' money. The public at worst are ignorant of and at best are disinterested in our proceedings and in what we do. They wonder what we do. I do not think they have any distinct outline of what the Seanad is about. Therefore, the calls for its abolition struck a fairly popular chord around election time. It may be because of ignorance but it is a case we are obliged to answer.
I am not saying that the Seanad is all bad and that everything is wrong with the Seanad. What I am saying is that there is massive room for improvement in our procedures, our functions, our personnel and our identity and our image. We should all have an obligation to get across to the public exactly what we are doing and how we fulfil a function which the Dáil does not. What we should do is try to portray a distinctive and useful role for ourselves which is not confused with the role of the other House. The Dáil is undoubtedly the democratically elected body and we should not try to compete with it on that score. It is the supreme body. It should have the ultimate say in any legislation or motion which goes through either House. We should try to carve an identity for ourselves which is recognised as different; it may be subordinate but it is useful and it is different.
My problem with the Seanad — and this is probably one which is shared by the majority of the public — is that it is far too party politically orientated. The Seanad, if possible, should be taken out of the realms of party politics. In our deliberations, in our numbers, in our complexion and in everything we do we are a shadow of what goes on in the other House. During this debate I would like to see Senators putting forward ideas as to how we can become more like the original concept of a Seanad — more a vocational concept and more a concept where people represent pressure groups and particular interests in our society rather than political parties.
This Seanad was known as a vocational Seanad. The original idea was that all sorts of pressure groups should be represented in this House. There is a vocational element in this House at present but that vocational element has become drowned by party political interests because the nominees of most of the vocational bodies are members of political parties. The division of the Seanad is 11 of the Taoiseach's nominees, six university Senators and 43 Members elected from the various panels. The result of having these panels is that every single one of those 43 is a committed member of a political party. Their first commitment is obviously to a political party. I will demonstrate that successfully by saying that out of the 43 Senators elected by the various panels at least 27 have at some stage stood for the Dáil. I stand corrected if this is wrong. I would like to read their names into the record: Senators Seán Haughey, Katherine Bulbulia, Joseph Doyle, Patrick Kennedy, Mary Wallace, Michael Ferris, Rory Kiely, John Connor, Charles McDonald, Paul Bradford, Padraic McCormack, William Ryan, Thomas Hussey, Tom Fitzgerald, Seán Byrne, Joachim Loughrey, Maurice Manning, Seán Fallon, Mick Lanigan, Philip Hogan, Brian O'Shea, Des Hanafin, Dan Kiely, Denis Cregan, Nuala Fennell, Brian Hillery and Larry McMahon. All these Senators have at some stage stood as candidates for the Dáil. There is nothing wrong with that but their first preference is to be Members of another House and the Seanad is very much their second preference. I do not like it being a second preference House. It is a pity that the Seanad remains a second preference House. We are aware when we are here of the laudable and the perfectly understandable ambitions of many Members of this House to get to the other House but it denigrates this House by their having stood for the Dáil and by their having indicated that preference.
I have suggested that one of the ways of ensuring that career politicians, those who are not failed or aspiring TDs, are elected to this House is to change the electoral system. This would be very simple. The idea of vocational bodies and vocational members has evidently failed. The reason why it has failed is not because of the nominating bodies; the elections are carried out by politicians. Quite understandably, politicians vote for politicians for various reasons. To take it out of the political arena it would be necessary to change the electoral college. In other words, to deprive outgoing Senators, incoming Dáil Deputies and county councillors of a vote. I have a vote and I would feel no great deprivation as an outgoing Senator if I lost that vote. I see no reason why I, as an outgoing Senator, should have a vote for an incoming Senator.
The result of the present system is that every Senator takes a party whip. The lines on which they break down are as rigid as they are in the Dáil. It is so seldom to see members of political parties in this House breaking the party whip that it proves and points to the loyalty which Senators hold, not to that body which nominated them, but to their party. One has only to listen, as I did several times in the last Seanad, to some of the speeches made in this House when many Members referred regularly to what they called "my constituency". They mean the "Dáil constituency".
I recall Senator Alexis FitzGerald and Senator Mark Killilea referring to "their constituencies". Their constituencies are the county councillors — the electorate. They refer to their constituencies as the geographical areas which they hope to represent in the Dáil. That is the sort of confusion of thinking between the two Houses. That indicates where those Senators want to be and what they feel this House is — it is merely a stepping stone for them to somewhere else. That is a great pity and a great shame. One has only to look at the motions which are put down in this House by the Opposition parties to see that they are party politically orientated. Senators have to do this because they are in groups and parties in this House. Most of the motions are reflections of the motions in the Dáil.
I should like to refer to the campaign for those 43 seats which those who have to win them have to go through. This is possibly one of the most ridiculous campaigns I have ever come across. It is degrading; it is a waste of time; it is humiliating; and it is absurd. People drive thousands and thousands of miles to achieve about 50 votes. They spend more time in their cars than they do canvassing votes. The system of election involves them in fighting — not on policy grounds, because one knows beforehand how many seats are going to each party — members of their own party to secure one of those seats. There are five or six people fighting for the three seats and they are fighting only for those three which are allotted to their own party. They do not fight on policies. They fight purely on personalities and on seeing that they beat the people within their own party.
At election time, one has only to ask a candidate who is on his panel and who he is standing against and he automatically names the people in his own party. I have never come across anybody who has mentioned any members of the opposition when asked who the other people are. They know there are seats allotted to them and that they have to beat those in their own party. They do not know who is standing in the opposition parties because they are not trying to take their seats. It is an absolutely absurd system that they have to canvass throughout the country on little policy, on backstabbing and deals to see that they keep out members of their party and get in themselves. That is not the way a Parliament should be elected and it is certainly not the way the Seanad should be elected.
I have already gone on record by pointing out one example of the absurdity of this system whereby one man — and he is not alone — of enormous distinction could not get elected on the panel system. This man is Ken Whitaker. He was appointed twice to the Seanad by two different Governments. He is as distinguished as any living Irishman in his record and achievements but at the last election he came nearly at the bottom of the poll. Ken Whitaker stood on the nomination of the Royal Irish Academy purely to demonstrate the point that, if he stands for election, he cannot get elected as a Member of the Seanad because the system works against him. One may not agree with his views. I do not agree with his views on anything. What I do not dispute is that he would have an enormous contribution to make to the deliberations of this House, but the system as it stands ensures that party political hacks are elected and that those who want to get into the Dáil are elected at the expense of those who have years of distinguished experience and different contributions to make to this House. That should be remedied. A man of distinction like Ken Whitaker — and there are many others — cannot get elected simply because the system favours those whose allegiance is to a political party.
I should like to see county councillors, the outgoing Seanad and the incoming Dáil taken completely out of the Seanad electoral process. I should also like to see the right of the Taoiseach to nominate 11 Members taken away. Traditionally these 11 Members have been nominated, to give the Taoiseach of the day a majority. Also successive Taoisigh have been able to place here those who will possibly gain Dáil seats. The Seanad has been unscrupulously and ruthlessly used for this purpose by successive Taoisigh.
At this stage I will make an exception to that by saying I think the most recent spate of Taoiseach's nominees are a great credit not only to the present Taoiseach but to this House. I welcome the majority of them. They are innovative. They are original and they have something completely different to offer. This trend was started by the present Taoiseach when he nominated Senators Robb and Mallon from Northern Ireland. It was an eye opener to me and to many others in this House to listen to Senators Robb and Mallon, coming from Northern Ireland, telling us things which are completely different from and totally out of step with the normal political jargon and line we hear in this House. I welcome those nominations and I welcome the continued nomination of people from Northern Ireland. I welcome in particular the five Senators who were nominated this time who are not taking the Fianna Fáil Party Whip. If we had more people with these types of contributions to offer and who come from these different strands of Irish life, the Seanad would be a far more useful and a far more relevant place.
The first principle that should be established is that the Seanad was never meant to be a democratically elected body in the pure sense. The Seanad was not meant to be: one man one vote; put them in; we represent the people. We do not represent the people. Nobody here represents the people as such. If one wants to represent the people one should be in the Dáil representing a constituency. The Seanad is not a democratically elected body and is not meant to be a democratically elected body in that pure sense.
I would like to see direct nominations to the Seanad by the nominating bodies. We should see a wider spread of nominating bodies. I was the first person to suggest that the Seanad should contain representatives of the unemployed, the underprivileged, the handicapped, the disabled, the trade union movement, the Confederation of Irish Industry, farmers, doctors, lawyers, businessmen, teachers and all sorts of people from different aspects of Irish life, not people whose first allegiance is to a party Whip but to the pressure groups they represent.
I want to refer to the procedures of the Seanad which I have found cumbersome and extremely unsatisfactory ever since I have come in here and, from what I can see from the record, were unsatisfactory for a long time before that. Private Members' Bills introduced in the Seanad by Independents have a deplorable record. It was said recently that the last Seanad, to the great credit of the last Leader of the House, was a very effective and a very different Seanad because Bills were initiated here. Bills were initiated here, but they were all Government Bills. Bills like the Clinical Trials Bill, the Children (Care and Protection) Bill and the National Monuments (Amendment) Bill were all Government Bills initiated here. While this was an improvement because it gave us a chance to make necessary and very good amendments, the record of Private Members' Bills in the Seanad is absolutely deplorable.
The last Private Members' Bill introduced by a private Member in the Seanad to be passed into law was the Protection of Animals (Amendment) Act, 1965. It is over 20 years since such a Bill was initiated in the Seanad and passed into law. All Private Members' Bills could not have been that bad. Several Private Members' Bills on the Order Paper were debated during the last Seanad but never got anywhere due to the constant obstruction of the Government at the time and the fact that the Government were not prepared to take a stand on them one way or the other.
That shows a certain contempt for the proceedings of this House and the opinions of those in this House. I respect the right of the Government to govern but I would like to be able to hear them say "no". Senator Brendan Ryan's Homeless Persons' Bill did not get through the House and my Bill on capital punishment was obstructed and temporised by the Government of the day. This again shows the contempt for this House. The Government should allow these Bills to be debated, should welcome their debate and they should give their reasons for rejecting them. The Dáil would and should be the final arbiter. I do not want to see the Seanad given increased power; I want to see the Seanad given increased opportunity and increased potential.
One of the most fundamental reforms that has been suggested, besides taking the county councils and the politicians out of the electoral process for the Seanad, is to hold the Dáil and Seanad elections on the same day. It is a very simple but a very fundamental reform. It is obvious that if the two elections were held on the same day that would surely remove a large degree of the political element from this House. It would mean that those who are in this House who want to stand for the Dáil as a first preference have made their choice and could not come here as a second choice. Those who want to stand for the Seanad and regard it as a preferable House would come here. It would remove a large number of party politicians from this House which, unfortunately, would be very welcome.
I should like to see also a system whereby Ministers were more accountable to the Seanad. The procedures of holding debates on the Adjournment which are held regularly here, is moderately unsatisfactory. It is only one particular issue per week. It is a restricted type of issue and it is not an issue which allows for backwards and forwards repartee, answers or supplementaries between the Minister and the Senator who raises the matter on the Adjournment. Such a system would give Senators scope to have a formal question time, when Ministers would come in and answer Senators' questions. This is something which ought to be considered.
There are other issues which apply just as much to the Dáil as to the Seanad. Why, for instance, do we not sit on Mondays and except in very exceptional cases on Fridays. I am told the reason is that the county councils sit on Mondays. It is a great pity that the county councils should decide when the Seanad and Dáil should sit. Why do we have such tremendously long holidays? Is it planned once again that we should break up at the end of June or the beginning of July and take four months holidays, the longest holidays of any parliament in Europe? Is there any reason for this? Is it because the Government have no legislation to bring forward? If they have no legislation why do they not have any legislation? I suggest that the Seanad and the Dáil should sit until August and take the month of August off only. If the Government cannot provide the legislation we will provide it for them. We have plenty of Bills in the pipeline which we will debate until the end of July and through August if necessary.
I would welcome the views of Senators on the Seanad. I hope that this is not going to become too much an "us and them" with people defending vested interests, a cosy club-like atmosphere. I would like to hear what Senators feel about including all those different strands which I have mentioned. I would like to hear what Senators feel about reducing the party political content in the Seanad.