Results 1-20 of 182 for going forward speaker:Michael McDowell

Seanad: Special Measures in the Public Interest (Derrybrien Wind Farm) Bill 2023: Second Stage (20 Feb 2024)

Michael McDowell: ...and to take into account that the national interest requires us to increase the volume of wind-generated energy rather than rely on fossil fuels of one kind or another, even on an emergency basis, to keep our economy going, our cities lit and industries operating. The legislation speaks for itself. It does not contravene European law. We have been assured of this by high legal...

Seanad: Restoration of Oireachtas Library and Reading Room: Motion (28 Nov 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...a committee room would be €1.63 million, meaning that in the first year of operation this would cost more than €5 million.The proposal is being mooted at the Dáil committee on the basis that the Dáil is going to expand, it needs to be more family-friendly and that somehow, if items such as Taoiseach's Questions and Minister's questions were taken in the reading room...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on European Union Affairs: Future Treaty Change in the European Union: Discussion (15 Nov 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...that said “No” to treaty change. Some of them are small but, when put together, the others are all of Scandinavia and all of the Baltic. That is a significant bloc in European politics. Going back to the Franco-German paper, this notion of the inner core members is floated every two years. It bubbles up like Mount Etna and goes back down again. However, nobody is...

Seanad: Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) Bill 2022: Committee Stage (24 Oct 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...couple of points. When we hear the Garda appealing for dashcam footage from ordinary road users, is there any problem with the use of such material evidentially? I sometimes wonder whether I can go around my neighbourhood willy-nilly with my dashcam on or if there is any control on my doing so as a local vigilante or whatever I might be. Second, do gardaí have dashcams right now or...

Seanad: Screening of Third Country Transactions Bill 2022: Second Stage (18 Oct 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...excite no security or political questions for the Irish State. I would like to know whether we should not have a system - and maybe it is somewhere buried in the Bill - whereby the Minister or the Government can, in respect of areas of economic activity, simply exempt them by statutory instrument. It seems to me that in order to minimise paperwork and bureaucracy, there are probably...

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Report Stage (Resumed) and Final Stage (4 Jul 2023)

Michael McDowell: ..., as it stands, effectively states that in future the so-called laypersons will have to be on a longlist approved by the Public Appointments Service as comprising suitable people. Their names then go to the Minister, who can choose which to propose to each House of the Oireachtas. That is the standard procedure. Unfortunately, however, it is the case that for the first number of years of...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences) Bill 2022: Second Stage (13 Jun 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...the section. To create such an offence without it being clear to everyone what is constituted by the term "hatred" is very dangerous. Some people may say that a behaviour, for example, outside a synagogue, was calculated to cause hatred to the Jewish population using their synagogue, who then attempt an arrest, or a member of An Garda Síochána may do so in the same...

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Report Stage (Resumed) and Final Stage (17 May 2023)

Michael McDowell: No, for the very reason I will outline. The huge pretence in this legislation, which I believe is politically dishonest, is that we are going to have politically neutral appointments made in the future. What we are doing here is vesting in the Minister the right to produce four people, chosen by him or her, to be on the commission to mark the judicial members, so to speak. Let me address...

Seanad: Electoral Reform (Amendment) and Electoral (Amendment) Bill 2023: Second Stage (10 May 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...xc9;ireann with a favourable wind behind them. How mistaken they were, according to the opinion polls. That is the cynicism we face. It has been suggested that Senator Malcolm Byrne's Bill might be the way forward. We need to understand what is involved in the provisions of that Bill. There are 1 million graduates of the National University of Ireland, NUI, as I was told recently by...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2023: Second Stage (25 Apr 2023)

Michael McDowell: ..., namely, that it is one thing to announce a policy and it is an entirely different thing to get the policy to come into effect. I refer to offshore wind generation, the amount of expenditure that is going to have to be put into national electricity grids, port services for offshore wind energy development and issues like that. There is a clear case for a careful application of the...

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Report Stage (Resumed) (18 Apr 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...of the Attorney General as somehow suspect. I find that it is media driven and mainly nonsensical. The Attorney General has many roles, one of which, under the Cabinet handbook, is to advise the Government on the suitability of a person's applying for judicial office. That role is at present provided for in the Cabinet handbook. The Attorney General must be consulted by the Minister...

Seanad: An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (23 Mar 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...can be advertised without any control at all. That was another piece of nonsense we walked into with our eyes wide open. A third point is the placing of advertising hoardings. The Bill put forward by the anti-alcohol lobby went so far as to say that one could not have an advertising hoarding within 100 m of a crèche or a school, as if kids are going to be able to distinguish...

Seanad: Environmental Protection Agency (Emergency Electricity Generation) (Amendment) Bill 2023: Committee and Remaining Stages (9 Mar 2023)

Michael McDowell: What I said - I want the Minister of State to be clear on this - was that what we did in Ireland was, in the context of other developments internationally, including in terms of methane, not going to prevent the melting of glaciers in an emergency situation. I believe that the Attorney General has given the Government good advice on this occasion and that the phraseology of the proposed new...

Seanad: Central Bank (Individual Accountability Framework) Bill 2022: Committee Stage (16 Feb 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...that might be of assistance to the person under investigation? If we take as an example the tracker mortgage issue, how much material would be attached to a draft report? Is everything that goes both ways obliged to be appended to the report? The Minister of State made reference to section 62. It is interesting that section allows documentary evidence of a hearsay kind to be used in...

Seanad: Protection of Private Residences (Against Targeted Picketing) Bill 2021: Second Stage (26 Jan 2023)

Michael McDowell: ...causing fear or serious interference with the capacity of the person to enjoy their own property, something like that. I am a bit worried about the exact phraseology of the Bill. I know it is only tendered to get the debate going. On the idea of 200 yd from the residence, where I live, the entire of Ranelagh centre would be a picket-free zone if this was passed in its present state. The...

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Committee Stage (Resumed) (26 Oct 2022)

Michael McDowell: That being the case, it seems the effect of the Bill and the refusal to accept this amendment is to say that, under the Constitution, the Oireachtas can tell the Government that it may not appoint certain people who are eligible to be made judges because they have not been recommended by a body that is not the Government. The Constitution refers to eligibility as a matter determined by law....

Seanad: Judicial Appointments Commission Bill 2022: Committee Stage (18 Oct 2022)

Michael McDowell: ...JAAB was perfect. However, to say this is an improvement on JAAB does not and cannot mean that it is the ideal solution. I do not accept the proposition. I often wonder who these laypeople are going to be. I am fairly certain they will face a cohort of judges and the judges are going to be in a position to discuss things beforehand and the laypeople will find themselves slightly on the...

Seanad Public Consultation Committee: Voices of All Communities on the Constitutional Future of the Island of Ireland: Discussion (30 Sep 2022)

Michael McDowell: ...this island, you are asking a substantial number of people to extinguish their ideology in practice and to revert to a sense of Britishness or whatever in a unitary state. Andrew Gallagher has put forward a paper which accords entirely with my view concerning a confederal arrangement whereby both parts of Ireland, as partners in a confederation, share membership of the European Union on...

Seanad: Electoral Reform Bill 2022: Committee Stage (Resumed) (6 Jul 2022)

Michael McDowell: ...up with a gimmick. The gimmick he decided to come up with was to announce, without any internal discussion whatsoever in the party, at a party dinner - I think it was in Citywest - that he was going to propose the abolition of Seanad Éireann. Many people in Fine Gael were astonished and shocked at this stunt, which it was, but that was his proposal. When he got into government, he...