Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail)

I am afraid that I am one of those people who is betwixt and between. I hate being in such a position because the arguments put forward by both sides contain considerable merit. I was in the House when the Abbeylara inquiry was brought to a sudden halt, literally overnight. I remember the late Seán Doherty chaired the committee investigating the telephony elements of a tender that was within 24 hours of completing witness statements and producing a finding. In its aftermath I applauded the efforts by the Minister present and Mr. Jim Higgins, MEP. I particularly applauded the efforts of Deputy Alan Shatter, now the Minister for Justice and Equality, who if I am correct went to the High Court at his own expense, or perhaps at the expense of the Houses, representing the Houses of the Oireachtas. The initiative was taken within these Houses to challenge the decisions taken that stopped the inquiries. I applauded that instinctively at the time because I felt that the people are sovereign and elect the Members of both Houses to represent them in all things. While I accept the idea of the separation of powers, Members were obliged to act in the public interest at all times and that was the motive behind the initial inquiries that were stopped suddenly.

That was my starting position but then I read articles in the immediate aftermath of the publication of this Bill that seemed to suggest that a certain architecture had subsequently been put in place that addresses the difficulties that arose around the time of the Abbeylara and other inquiries and focused the minds of the Judiciary to such an extent that they stopped us collectively from conducting similar investigations.

I was struck, and still am, by the fact that Governments have appointed judges or former judges to head inquiries and those inquiries appear to have been carried out in a fair and judicious manner with minimum cost to the State - the Murphy report is one example - and in a speedy and efficient manner. That raised the question in my mind of whether taking this road will result in a lawyers' charter. All the safeguards that are built into the Bill, coupled with those that Senator Mullen suggests are not included, appear to be centred around the rights of the individual, and those constitutional rights must be protected at all times. A citizen, therefore, much as they might believe they are competent in the area of law, will inevitably have recourse to the legal system. The question thus arises as to whether these inquiries, once they are initiated, become a lawyers' charter and we ultimately find ourselves in a situation where we should not have taken this road at all. That is where I am betwixt and between.

I assume the Referendum Commission will discharge its obligations to the public in advance of this referendum by putting forward the for and against positions; in other words, it will explain the reasons for them. The Referendum Commission takes a neutral position on referenda and puts forward the pros and cons to the voters, like a balance sheet-----