Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 25 November 2014

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Public Expenditure and Reform

Registration of Lobbying Bill 2014: Committee Stage

5:20 pm

Photo of Brendan HowlinBrendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The imposition of restrictions on post-term employment on relevant designated public officials must be proportionate and practical. We have taken very careful advice because people have constitutional rights. The categories included are Ministers, Ministers of State, special advisors, public servants of a prescribed description - in the first instance they will be Secretaries General, assistant secretaries general, CEOs of local authorities and directors of services of local authorities.
These are the categories of office-holders of officials who are most likely to have worked personally or substantially on the types of policy matters this provision is intended to address. These are also the categories of persons who are most likely to have direct links back to individual public bodies and be in a position to be influential in lobbying such bodies.
This would not be the case for Members of these Houses by virtue of their very differing role. Similarly, I do not believe that it would be proportionate to apply a one-year cooling-off period to members of local authorities in light of their part-time role.
It is something we might think about. It would be a shock if we told newly-elected local authority members that there was a restriction on their future employment for a period of a year. I do not believe that is proportionate and that is why I believe they should be exempted. I have given some consideration to these matters and the provisions in the Bill are proper and proportionate and will meet objective criteria without being excessively onerous or impacting on people's right to work.
On amendments Nos. 92 and 93, the cooling-off period is limited to one year. Again the provision must be proportionate and practical to operate. We have to ensure that the cooling-off period deals with the public policy objective, which is to prevent what has been characterised as an immediate “switching of sides” - whereby a poacher becomes gamekeeper or vice versa. It is balanced with the personal rights and freedoms of an individual to earn a living.
It is increasingly difficult to get people of calibre to find the public service acceptable because of the degree of scrutiny under which public servants of all ilks, including volunteers on committees, rightly now find themselves. There are the Standards in Public Office Commission registration requirements and other things. In each case we need a proportionate and balanced approach. I believe one year after leaving a job is a sufficient period of time to address that issue.
This approach reflects a review of the duration of similar provisions in other jurisdictions which highlighted that the introduction of a two-year restriction for a relatively wide range of public officials would fall into the upper-end of the international norms, notwithstanding that there are even longer cooling-off periods in some jurisdictions.
The one-year period also aligns with the current post-public employment restriction in place under the Civil Service code of standards and behaviour. This provision is focused on lobbying activity. I will be reviewing the wider issues relating to conflict of interest in the ongoing current review of the ethics legislation. We will return to that matter when we introduce the new ethics Bill. As the Deputy knows, I plan to consolidate the ethics legislation into one enactment and to have regard for the recommendations of the Mahon tribunal and other tribunals in doing so. We will have an opportunity to deal with direct conflicts of interest in that regard.
Amendment No. 94 is a technical amendment to ensure that there is consistency of phrasing in the Bill.
Amendment No. 95 was requested by SIPOC so that it can determine the manner and form in which applications for consent under section 22, which relates to restrictions on post-term employment as lobbyist, should be submitted to it.

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.