Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I value the opportunity to participate in this debate. I welcome Tom Arnold and Art O'Leary to the Distinguished Visitors Gallery. Like others, I want to start by paying tribute to all the staff of the convention who have been very effective in ensuring that it worked smoothly and effectively. The background organisation has been quite superb. I regret very much that I was not able to attend on the last two occasions but in respect of the previous events one could not but be impressed by the manner in which they were organised.

As alluded to by Deputy Catherine Murphy, I was also impressed by the way in which the citizen members participated and their palpable sense of excitement and pride in having the opportunity, as presented by the convention, to participate. I also pay tribute to political colleagues, many of whom found it difficult to contain themselves. In the early days of the convention one of the concerns was that we would hear far too much from politicians and not enough from the citizen members. Under the control of the chair and with some cajoling, the politicians succeeded in containing their contributions and not influencing the course of the convention in a way that perhaps they could have done, but I enter a personal caveat about the format of the convention. Having politicians participating and voting does distort the outcome. We are getting a different outcome from the convention than we would get if we had 100 citizens there, albeit 100 citizens who might on occasion in the course of their work be addressed by politicians who would give their views and their perspectives on the issues coming before them. I would come away from the convention thinking that it would be a stronger, more effective and more representative process if politicians were not directly involved and I say that with the best will in the world. It has been my experience that when one sits around the tables, albeit that people are not going there under any Whip as Deputy Charles Flanagan said, one finds oneself almost invariably arguing the party line, especially if a member from another party is arguing his or her party line. That tit for tat exchange arises and the convention would be stronger if that was not a feature of it.

In the early days when we were discussing this the Taoiseach engaged actively with the Opposition parties in how this convention was to be undertaken. I repeatedly pointed out to him that the process lacked ambition. There were some challenging issues such as the same sex marriage issue that came before us but in terms of issues that are agitating people the need for constitutional reform, such as it is, is not as obvious on the agenda that has been given to us. Like Deputy Catherine Murphy, I pay tribute to the secretariat and the chair in that they have agreed to identify issues to which we will return as the Standing Orders allow us at the end of the process. Those issues that are identified by citizens and politicians alike in the course of the convention will take perhaps more time to consider than is currently envisaged in the way in which the convention is being organised.

Two issues are the subject of today's report. It is good that we are having this debate but I am conscious we are starting it on the last day of term. There is a certain degree of truncation inevitably in the debate that will take place here today. One can argue that the two issues before us are not of enormous significance and do not require a great deal of debate but I would like to think that the subsequent reports that will come to us on the meatier issues will receive more detailed consultation and discussion in the Houses than these issues are likely to get. One of the issues before us is the reduction of the voting age to 16, and I was surprised that was the decision of the convention. The young people who came in to address the convention were particularly impressed by this and the vote on it, 47:52 or whatever the figures were, was quite close. We should respect the integrity of the process. I hope the Government will proceed with a referendum on this issue and give the people the opportunity to decide. If the Government wishes to see the voting age of 16 installed in the Constitution, a great deal of work will have to be done to convince the Irish people that this age should be enshrined in the Constitution and that people should be encouraged to vote at that age. As a parent I have some reservations about the adultification of children. There are many other areas of State activity where we talk about protecting the child and the rights of the child. There is a certain contradiction in a position where one sees 18 as the age of majority and one seeks to protect a person as a child up to the age of 18, while one advocates that this person should vote. We all visit schools on a regular basis and to a man and a woman we would have to report that the young people in schools tell us they would like to be able to vote. Those in second year, third year and transition year tell us they would love to have the opportunity to vote but we all know that the 18 to 25 age cohort has the lowest number of participants in the democratic process. In approaching this issue I have tended to say to these young people that if they could convince their older brothers and sisters who have a vote to use it that this would become perhaps the most compelling argument for reducing the voting age thereafter.

On the issue of the term of the President, I do not know how it found its way onto the agenda of the convention. It being on the agenda is one of the issues that tended to undermine the validity of the convention to some extent. I do not recall ever meeting anybody who raised concerns with me about the term of the Presidency. I met many people who had issues about how the President was selected and how one could win a nomination. In fairness to Senator David Norris, he came along to the convention and while he was his usual colourful self, the way in which he highlighted the issue brought home to all of us who were present the ludicrous, almost incongruous, situation that existed, whereby the public were talking about, say, the abolition of the Seanad but we could not discuss that issue during the course of the convention.

Obviously, Senator Norris raised the methodology for nominating presidential election candidates in light of his own experiences in that regard.

In the aftermath of all of that, I would like to think these Houses are at the beginning of a process of careful evaluation of the reports we will receive from the Constitutional Convention. I hope adequate time will be made available over the coming months for an evaluation of each of those reports. The Houses of the Oireachtas must respect the proposals in the report that has been given to us. I look forward to considering the Government's proposal to put to the people the question of whether the voting age should be reduced to 16.

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