Brendan Howlin
Ceist:3. Deputy Brendan Howlin asked the Taoiseach his plans for reform of Seanad Éireann. [21238/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraWednesday, 23 May 2018
Ceisteanna (3)
Freagraí ó Béal (9 píosaí cainte)
I have established an implementation group on Seanad reform, having consulted with other party leaders, to consider the Manning report and develop specific proposals to legislate for Seanad reform. The implementation group comprises Members of the Oireachtas with the assistance of outside experts, as appropriate. The group held its first meeting on 9 May 2018 and is due to report back in October.
As for the idea of a committee with 26 politicians on it talking about Seanad reform and the possibility of experts being attached to it as well, I wish all those involved well.
Did the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport nominate himself? Is this a new procedure, whereby Ministers can sit on such committees? What is the purpose of the Minister sitting on the committee? The committee will report, presumably, to the Taoiseach and the Government. Does the Minister not trust what the Government might do with the report? Does he think that it might be binned or shredded and that it might never been seen or does he have particular insights, having been a denizen of the Seanad over many long decades? Is he perhaps out to settle scores? We all heard about a recent episode in the canteen which seemed to be quite colourful and heated in nature, involving a dispute with former allies. Perhaps he has it in for some of the former or current Members of the Seanad. Can the Taoiseach enlighten us on the change in procedures? Does he feel it is helpful that Ministers can now nominate themselves or be nominated to this kind of committee?
The Taoiseach addressed the Seanad earlier this year on the topic of Seanad reform and suggested that Senators from nationalist and unionist communities in the North should be elected. I note the recent by-election resulted in the election of Senator Ian Marshall, who is from the unionist community. He was elected with the support of Sinn Féin and Fine Gael, and will bring a different perspective to that House. Senator Niall Ó Donnghaile, who is from east Belfast, brings a more nationalist North of Ireland perspective to the situation. Both of those Senators were elected in the bizarre and archaic fashion used for the election of Seanadóirí, which we all recognise as something that needs to change. The Manning report recommended that the franchise be extended to all citizens and the diaspora.
What are we going to do to make that happen? There is no constitutional impediment to doing so, and the Oireachtas can confer the right to register to vote in Seanad elections to both Irish citizens living in the North and to those holding Irish passports and living abroad. Does the Taoiseach support the recommendations of the Manning report to extend the franchise to citizens in the North and to the diaspora, and will he commit to bringing forward some form of legislation to secure that in the time ahead?
First, it has to be said that when the Fine Gael proposal to abolish the Seanad was defeated, the central reason was the refusal to consider more wide-ranging political reform. It has taken far too long to set up this committee. It is rather bizarre that the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Shane Ross, decided to sit on the committee. Some believe it was his last-ditch effort to stop Senator McDowell. I do not know what that is all about, but I think it is unbecoming of him. He needs to focus on his job. He should do something about the second runway in Dublin Airport, the most critical issue in his remit. Meanwhile, he is on every committee, nipping into other ministerial portfolios than his own.
On the reform issue, I put it to the Taoiseach that at the commencement of this Dáil we outlined a series of ambitious reforms for this House. I ask the Taoiseach to reflect on the supports that we are giving the Oireachtas in implementing those reforms. The Parliamentary Budget Office is up and running, but I recall that there was about a year's delay in approving the head of that office, with questions around the level within the public service they were to be accorded and whether they were to be at assistant secretary or deputy secretary general level. The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform initially insisted on a principal officer grade for that post. The same concerns apply with the Office of the Parliamentary Legal Adviser. It should be an independent office of note in regard to the quality of the people recruited and the level to which they are recruited.
Dáil and Seanad reform will need resources. I ask the Taoiseach to convene a meeting of the party leaders to reflect on the progress we have made since the commencement of this Dáil. For example, there was an offer of assistance in the drafting of Opposition legislation in order to ensure the final measures passed by the House are of a higher quality. The Taoiseach has justified the Government's blocking of legislation from the Opposition on the grounds that he felt it to be poorly drafted. That would not be an issue if there was more comprehensive assistance available as these offices develop and are strengthened.
The programme for Government also promises to evolve better methods of sharing information from Departments with Deputies. In reality, the sharing of information has become much worse. Briefings which were once common have now nearly stopped. Information is now mainly shared via planted stories in newspapers, rather than any accountable forum. Can the Taoiseach outline the proposals he is bringing forward to implement the commitment to being more open in sharing information?
Finally, I note that the Taoiseach recently lectured Ministers about leaking Cabinet information. In a spectacular U-turn from his practices as a Minister, he has decided this is not to be tolerated. Can he say what steps he is taking to find and punish the leakers?
In regard to the size of the committee, I note that it has a maximum membership of 26 but it only has 22 people nominated to it. It does seem like a lot, and it is a lot, but it is actually not much greater than the number of people sitting around the Cabinet table. It may not be as huge as it seems to people, but it is a large number. The reason for that is twofold. First, every group had to have at least one representative, including the Civil Engagement group, the Independent Alliance and the Social Democrat-Green group. We did not think it was appropriate to leave out any group. Once that was done, there also had to be proportionality. Very big groups like Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Sinn Féin should have more members than very small groups. We then get to the figure of 20-something, whether we like it or not.
It is not unprecedented. The all-party Committee on Future Funding of Domestic Water Services, the all-party Committee on the Future of Mental Health Care and the all-party Joint Committee on the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution had similar numbers of members and produced good outcomes in a reasonable time period, so I do not think we should underestimate the capacity of people nominated to that committee to deliver the goods. The Independent Alliance has one member, and that member is indeed the Minister, Deputy Ross. As all members of the Independent Alliance are Ministers, I imagine they had no alternative but to appoint a Minister to represent them on that committee. It is an unusual situation for all members of a group to be Ministers, but that is the situation at the moment.
Regarding Seanad reform, I very much agree with the proposal to have people in the Seanad who represent the diaspora and Irish citizens overseas. That is done to an extent with Senator Billy Lawless, who has been appointed as a Taoiseach's nominee to the Seanad. However, as they have in France, for example, I would like to see people elected from international constituencies, maybe North America, Europe and so on, representing our citizens overseas. I also very much want to see the voice of Northern Ireland represented in our Seanad. When the Free State Seanad was established, part of its original role was to represent unionist voices. Half of the members of the first Free State Seanad were indeed unionist voices, particularly Southern unionists. I definitely think that our Seanad would add to our Parliament if we had more people from Northern Ireland sitting in it. We have two now, or possibly three; I refer to the recently elected Senator Ian Marshall. However, I think we could have more. That would definitely add to our Parliament, and that is something I very much favour.
The Constitution makes all this very complicated, by the way. People may not be aware of this, but the Constitution requires that Seanad elections are carried out by postal vote. A postal vote involving perhaps a 1 million votes in Northern Ireland is not an easy operation. A postal vote involving millions of votes from all over the world - Irish people are now all over the world - is going to be logistically complicated and very expensive. Perhaps it is not even a good idea, but it would require a constitutional change to avoid it. It is also going to require that we develop a whole new register of electors. Not only would we need to register people in Northern Ireland and people all over the world, but our Constitution requires that people elect to vote on a particular panel. Changing that would require a constitutional amendment. It is not good enough that people are registered to vote; they will have to register to vote and opt to be an elector on a certain panel, and I think that is going to be very confusing for people. The panels that exist were invented in 1930s. They derive from a papal encyclical, the name of which I forget, and they probably do not reflect the way modern society breaks down.
This is not going to be a simple reform, for those reasons among others. However, the remit of the committee is not to come up with a new set of proposals. The remit of the committee is to implement the Manning report. This is an implementation group, and I expect that it will help to produce the legislation which we will then put through this House and the other House, allowing the next Seanad or the Seanad after it to be elected according to these new rules. Its terms of reference enable it to come up with alternatives if the committee finds that some of the aspects of the Manning report are impractical.
In terms of resources, the Houses are obviously run by the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission. I imagine the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has a role in approving. I am not sure how that works, but the Department perhaps has a role in approving particular posts and so on. Perhaps the solution to that is just to give the Oireachtas more autonomy within its own budget to decide at what grade people should be hired. That practice does exist. It is called delegated sanctions.
It took a year.
Perhaps for next year's budget, we could just give the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission its budget, and give it delegated sanction-----
Could we agree to meet on that?
-----to decide whether to have fewer people at a higher grade or more people at a lower grade as it sees fit. Yes, I will certainly do that. I will convene the party leaders over the next couple of weeks to discuss all those reform issues.