Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

There is no praise involved here. As the Deputy is aware, for years at the beginning of every Dáil session the Government of the day published lists, A - Bills expected to be published; B - Bills for which the heads have been agreed and are being drafted; and C - Bills for which the heads have yet to be approved, with lists A and B being given priority and to be published in that session. However, the commitment was never lived up to, as the Deputy well knows. In the last session, the Government of which the Deputy was a member published three sessional programmes comprising 20, 14 and 23 Bills on the A, B and C lists and managed to get to only seven, ten and 11 on each list. On this occasion, I told Ministers that when they spoke to the Secretary General in the Department, they were to see to it that whatever Bills they brought forward were able to be published and dealt with in this session. This will bring a sense of reality to it rather than having a long list that might not see the light of day during the session.

The question of constitutional amendments has been spoken about extensively. The Government did not commit to holding any constitutional referendum in tandem with a presidential election. However, quite a number of comments have been made by groups such as children's advocacy groups suggesting it might be possible to deal with it that way. Obviously, the Government mentioned a number of other areas including accountability in respect of the question on the Abbeylara decision and in respect of giving protection to people who might inform public representatives as public or private citizens on issues which should be made known. These matters are being given consideration also.

The Deputy is well aware that to hold any constitutional referendum, let us say in the context of a presidential election whenever that might be, it is necessary to bring forward a Bill to set up a referendum commission and the Government is giving consideration to this. I have written formally to the Attorney General to start the process in respect of the preparation of work on the question to be asked about the abolition of the Seanad which, as the Deputy is aware, cannot be abolished without the imprimatur of the people. All references to the Seanad in the Constitution will have to be taken into account and I have advised the Attorney General formally of this.

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