The Order of Business is items 1, 2 and 3. There will be one speaker from each group or party on item 1, as is traditional. Speakers will have 15 minutes. All Stages will be taken on the understanding that a motion will be put down in the next session enabling the Bill's contents to be debated fully in the new year. Item 2 will be taken without debate, and Report and Final Stages of item 3, a Seanad Bill which was amended by the Dáil.
Order of Business.
The Order of Business is agreed. It is almost exactly the same as last year so I can hardly object. Will the Leader make the Government's programme for legislation for the next session available to leaders of all groups during the recess? The Government has been in power for six months and there is no reason its programme should not be disseminated to Opposition groups. That would allow us to plan our business.
I join with the Cathaoirleach in thanking those who have made the workings of the House so smooth, such as the staff of the House and the ushers as well as the Cathaoirleach and his office for the efficient way the election was carried out this year. I send special good wishes to two members of the press who are unwell: Ms Mary Cummins, who has been unwell for some time and Mr. Joe Power who is in hospital. I wish them both the best of health for 1998.
I and the Independent group wish to be associated with the compliments paid to the staff of the House who have made the workings of the House so efficient. I wish them a happy Christmas and an election-free new year.
We should resume the debate on resources and support for Members. We are aware that staff are being kept at full stretch by the lack of resources, which is grossly unfair. On many occasions we have made it clear how hard it is for us because of the lack of support and office space, but many offices here, including the Seanad office, are struggling because of a lack of resources. This could be raised in the debate on the Appropriation Bill.
Hear, hear.
One of the issues which we might raise in the discussion on the Appropriation Bill is a lack of a budget for this House to run its own business.
Hear, hear.
Can the Leader of the House correct an unfair headline in yesterday's Evening Herald which said, “TDs 40 Day Holiday”.
They were talking about teachers.
This is another example of the need to get the message across that Members of the Oireachtas have a heavy work load. We need to look at the question of sitting days and non-sitting days. I take a different view from the Evening Herald. I think Members should only be allowed into the Oireachtas on half the days of the week. They should be anchored to their constituencies after that.
A former Taoiseach has raised a constitutional difficulty about the Moriarty tribunal and, more importantly, about the constitutionality of the Ethics in Public Office Act. That Act requires Members of the Oireachtas to make certain returns to the Clerks of the Dáil and Seanad before a date in the new year. It would be terrible if we were to do something which we might discover later had trammelled on our constitutional rights. Can the Leader give us advice on this matter, perhaps over the Christmas period? Should we defer sending back those returns until we get a clear indication whether the Act is constitutional?
It is too late.
I wish to be associated with the seasonable remarks made by yourself and by the leaders of the other Opposition groups and to wish the two members of the press corps who are ill an early recovery to good health.
I support Senator Manning's call for the circulation of the next session's proposed business during the Christmas recess. Yesterday, the Leader of the House presented an impressive record of 25 Bills in the last session and our possible entry in the "Guinness Book of Records" for introducing four Bills in one week.
I compliment Senator Norris on seeking to find out the regulations for the processing of asylum seekers and for raising this matter on the Adjournment.
I cannot allow the debate on the Adjournment to be anticipated on the Order of Business.
Six weeks ago the Secretary of the Department of Justice apologised to asylum seekers who were left waiting in the rain. He has now taken the good out of that apology by saying that most of these people were illegal immigrants. Can the Leader ask the Minister for Justice if the Secretary of his Department can make such a pre-emptive strike on 4,000 out of the 5,000 applicants for asylum when none of them has been processed?
I have no objection to the Order of Business. I join with you and with the other Members in your seasonable greetings and I thank you and the Leas-Chathaoirleach for the way in which you conducted the business of the House during this session. I support Senator O'Toole's remarks about the staff of the House, the work they do and the conditions under which they are asked to work. This is a matter which needs to be investigated. I join in the greetings to the staff of the House, the reporting staff and the members of the Press and I wish everyone a happy Christmas and a prosperous new year. May we all be back here this time next year.
This is the time of year when people from all walks of life, especially those working in the capital city, travel home to their native town or townland. We recently debated the work of the National Roads Authority. I hope the necessary funding will be made available to ensure that everybody travelling through Kinnegad gets home on time. It has been described as the gateway to the west but in reality it is the bottleneck to the west.
I join in the good wishes to you, Sir. You have remained resolutely good humoured despite various provocations — some, I regret to say, from myself. I also join in the good wishes to the staff of the House.
I disagree with my colleague, Senator O'Toole, when he suggested, in a light hearted manner, that we should be restricted in our access to the House. I have made the point on previous occasions that we should have full access. Perhaps the Leader would look into this. It is absurd that we are denied access from 9 o'clock on a Friday evening until 9 o'clock on a Monday morning while the electricians, broadcasters and cleaners are trusted with entry.
Will the Leader consider arranging a debate early in the New Year on the way in which the media reports cases involving sexual crimes? The treatment of such cases by the media in the last few days is highly dangerous and emotional. It is overkill and it will lead to people being injured. We need a calm and reasoned debate on this subject.
I am pleased with the proposed programme of legislation for the new year. The Roads Bill is to be taken, which will have implications for the underground Luas development. When will it be introduced? The war crimes tribunal legislation, which has been sought for some time, is also due.
The issue of plant varieties is very disturbing; it would appear that it is possible to claim proprietorial rights over species of plants. I am pleased to see that legislation is due. The Seanad Electoral Bill is also due. I will be silent on this except to observe that when people in the North of Ireland look at this development it may raise some questions. Perhaps my colleagues and I will return to the issue in the new session. An Seanadóir Séamus Ó Coisdealbha amazed me when he expressed his lack of understanding that the Secretary of a Department could launch a pre-emptive strike when he himself was in the middle of a pre-emptive strike on my motion for the Adjournment.
I hope Senator Norris does not think I am getting after him in my remarks. I thank the staff for their work. Given that the Captain of the Guard is present, I congratulate him on his efforts to ensure that paper is recycled in the House and that recycled paper is used on photocopying machines. It is a topic dear to my heart.
Early this year the Department of Foreign Affairs commissioned a report on the refugee agency from consultants and from the refugee studies programme in Oxford University. The report was completed in July but it has not been published. Will the Leader ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs if it is to be published and, if so, when? It might help us understand the various problems which are arising in dealing with refugees.
Following conversations I have had with a number of colleagues on all sides of the House and in view of the time of year, will the Leader consider holding a debate on homelessness early in the new session? Those of us watching the evening news yesterday could not but have been appalled at the interview with a couple, including a pregnant woman, living on the side of the street in the centre of this city with no prospect of a house this side of Christmas and with every indication that they will have to wait until the birth of their child before the authorities will consider giving them even a flat.
That is only one of many cases. I understand RTÉ television is to undertake extensive programming on homelessness over the next few days. It behoves the House to concentrate on this issue at this time when another couple with an expectant mother was looking for a home. I do not wish to be emotive but sometimes being passionate about these matters helps to concentrate people's minds. In light of the report last week that 30 per cent of homeless people in London are Irish and that this subject comes under the remit of several Departments, it might be useful to have a debate which would identify the problems and propose solutions.
I support what Senator Mooney has just said. We are very grateful for all that the so-called Celtic tiger has brought us, although I have come to dislike that expression, and it is particularly galling to view the plight of the homeless in the light of the great success of our economy. A roof over everyone's head, at least, should be within the grasp of this and recent Governments. That should be the bottom line.
The Taoiseach recently alluded in the Dáil to his intention to set up an all-party committee to monitor changes in the public service and the implementation of the strategic management initiative. Will the Leader inform the House what exactly the Taoiseach has in mind and whether Members of the Seanad will be included on that committee? While it is not exactly headline grabbing news, reform and change in the civil and public services are intrinsic to our work and the services provided by the State.
Will the Leader consider having an all day discussion on the progress of Delivering Better Government and the strategic management initiative as soon as possible in the new session? I do not want to have a combative debate as such, because there is all party agreement on moving forward on this matter, but it would be better to have a brief question and answer session for an hour or two with the Minister concerned, whom I believe is Deputy Brennan, after the making of statements. In that way we could tease out answers rather than having the Minister deliver a prepared script which would not take account of what had been said during the debate.
Senator Manning asked about the list of proposed legislation. I understand the usual procedure is for the Government to set its list of priorities at the first Cabinet meeting of the new year, if it does not do so at this morning's Cabinet meeting. I informed the House that 25 Bills were published this session, which was a remarkable achievement considering six Bills were published during the first Seanad session of the Rainbow Government. The next session is shorter than this one and I will inform the House as soon as the Government makes its list of priorities known to me.
Senators Manning, Costello, O'Toole, Dardis and Norris raised the issue of the Seanad having an independent budget. We should have a Committee on Procedure and Privileges meeting under your stewardship, a Chathaoirligh, to plan our strategy to progress this proposal. We are all, as a result of our experiences over the past two months, favourably disposed to that common sense proposal which would ensure the smooth running of the House.
Senator O'Toole referred to the inaccurate coverage by the press of the number of Oireachtas sitting days. The Minister of State, Deputy Brennan, has set up a new committee structure. It is misleading for newspapers to say the Dáil sits 100 days and the Seanad 90 days when committees will probably meet for the same amount of time. Public representatives do not have as long a holiday as most of the private sector. We get two or three weeks holiday but the media have been consistently inaccurate in its reporting of this. I am pleased Senator O'Toole brought the matter to the attention of the House.
I will convey the concerns of Senator Costello to the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform. I will also convey the concerns of Senator Glynn to the Minister for the Environment and Local Government. As a member of the same local authority as Senator Glynn, I hope the Kinnegad bypass will be open for Christmas next year.
Senator Norris asked for another debate on Luas. I will facilitate him at the earliest opportunity. The plans for O'Connell Street and the surrounding areas are welcome.
Absolutely.
We will have a debate on that in the first two or three weeks after the recess.
Senator Mooney raised the issue of homelessness. I made a commitment to the House to debate the issue, possibly in the first two weeks after the recess. Senator Avril Doyle also expressed her concern. It is a distressing and disturbing situation in any country, especially at Christmas. I agree with all the sentiments expressed. Senator Doyle also asked for the Minister of State, Deputy Séamas Brennan, to come to the House to discuss the future of the public and Civil Service. Many changes are being considered and I know the Minister will be pleased to accept Senator Doyle's invitation. We will debate that issue when we return and when the House considers it suitable.
A Chathaoirligh, I congratulate you on your stewardship during the first session of the 21st Seanad. I also thank the Leas-Chathaoirleach for his courtesy and understanding. I thank the Clerk and Assistant Clerk of the Seanad and their staff for their guidance. I thank the Superintendent and the Captain of the Guard and their staff, including the ushers, for their help. I thank the broadcasting staff and the press, especially Jimmy Walsh who covers the proceedings of this House daily. I join with Senator Manning in wishing Mary Cummins and Joe Power a speedy recovery. We look forward to having them back in the new year. I thank the leaders of the various groups and the Whips for their co-operation. I thank the new Deputy Leader of the House, Senator Dardis, the Government Chief Whip, Senator Tom Fitzgerald, and the Assistant Government Chief Whip, Senator Farrell, for their help. I also thank our office staff for their help during the session. I thank all Members of the House who were courteous, kind and understanding in this session and anyone who helped in the proceedings of the House in any way. I wish them all a very Happy Christmas and a holy and prosperous new year. We look forward to returning next year for the new session.
Senator Cassidy forgot to thank the nuns for the use of the hall.
Order of Business agreed to.