Diarmuid Wilson (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome back the Minister of State. He has made an excellent contribution to national politics since he first came to this House and I mean that genuinely.

Like any other citizen, I have a responsibility to speak out and shout out loud when I see a great and important institution being vandalised. That responsibility is even greater when the vandalism is being done to the most basic and fundamental institution in the State, namely, our Constitution. That is precisely what we, as legislators and guardians of the Constitution, are being asked to do in voting for this Bill.

Some colleagues on the Government side may want to comfort themselves by thinking that we are merely referring a matter to the people for their decision. A quick read through the 19 pages of the deletions from the Constitution, set out in the Bill, should stir them from their complacency. The Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, acknowledged this himself when he stated earlier in May: "My book is the Constitution." Why is he now taking a slash hook to the Constitution to abolish the House? Why is he giving the Constitutional Convention almost a year to reflect, debate and consider a range of individual changes yet expects the Oireachtas to swallow such a major democratic transformation in a matter of days? A fundamental change to the Constitution and system of government merits far more consideration, discussion and debate than the Government is allowing. Ironically, we are supposed to be doing all of this in the name of political reform.

The proposal before us is based on a series of glaring myths. The first myth is that this proposal was ever anything other than a political stunt. Other colleagues have mentioned the Fine Gael Party's dinner. I am not sure whether it was held in the City West Hotel or the Burlington Hotel.