Michael McNamara (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I said had not intended to contribute to the debate. If I had a problem with the legislation, I would contribute to the debate. I do not vote on stuff that I have not read, if I can help it. I certainly do not purport to vote on matters if I am not here to vote or anything like that. I do not want to go down that road. I want to strike that from the record. I withdraw that comment. It is important that we have proper legislative scrutiny. Pre-legislative scrutiny having been carried out months ago, there is no reason being given by the Government as to why this legislation could not have been debated before now. Instead, we are now being told that we are not actually debating the legislation that is before us, which I have managed to look at and do not have a problem with. I had not intended to contribute to the debate. We are now being told that a load of amendments are going to be brought on Committee Stage, and they are going to be rammed through. A guillotine procedure might even be used so that we will not get to discuss them. That happens. If the Minister of State does not believe that it happens, then he was not here last night. At a conservative estimate, €2.4 billion of taxpayers' money will be spent on the pyrite scheme, but everybody believes it will be a lot more. It is fundamentally undemocratic. There is a lot of celebration of Irish independence, the fact that the Dáil is the only body that can make laws for Ireland and that we can elect our own people to the Dáil, and rightly so. Yet, here we are legislating by decree, almost.

If the Government wants to legislate by decree then it should do so and bring in regulations but if it wants to actually legislate, it is important we can discuss and tease out fully the content of that legislation.

I greatly welcome the comments in that regard by my colleague from the mid-west, Deputy Leddin, that we need time to discuss legislation and that there is plenty of time available to us generally to discuss legislation, though we might use it for other things. Regardless of where all these statements come from - and I am not going to labour this point any more - there is this tendency to bulldoze legislation through at the end. It has been commented on by another component of the Oireachtas, namely, the President, that it is troublesome. We should also bear in mind this legislation arises out of a Supreme Court judgment and seeks to address an anomaly in the law, but the response to it then is to ram legislation through without considering it fully and to add amendments to it that cannot be considered, at least on Second Stage, because we do not know what they are. We are, therefore, going to bring in legislation to deal with an anomaly in the law by ramming legislation through and possibly, at least, creating more anomalies in that law in that regard. Legislation may not be the most interesting or glamorous part of a Deputy's life but it is what we are elected to do and we should be allowed to do it. A Government should not, like a power-drunk county council, abuse numbers to just ram stuff through.

I accept there is occasionally a need for emergency legislation that must be rushed through overnight. The legislation dissolving the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, IBRC, is one example. If that had not been brought in by the next morning it would have had considerable financial repercussions for the State but this is not legislation like that. It simply is not, and most of the legislation that is being rammed through is not like that. It shows a disregard for democracy. That is an easy statement to make, one the Opposition makes regularly but one you rarely hear Government Deputies making, though when I was one I made it with regard to legislation that was guillotined. I should say I was not a Government Deputy but rather I was a Government-supporting Deputy. You are either a member of Government or you are not. Hearing these concerns from some on the Government benches is very welcome. I hope the Government will listen, if not to the Opposition making these points then to its own backbenchers making them.

I reiterate I do not have a problem with what is in this legislation but it is what is proposed to be put in at short notice that concerns me and the corrosive effect that has on democracy if that is how it is done. That sets a precedent not just for this Dáil but future Dáileanna and future Governments. Members of the Government will not have a majority forever and they will probably be complaining about legislation being rammed through once they lose this majority.

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