Vincent P Martin (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Like other members, I thank the Minister of State for her attendance, but I also thank her for her full engagement. I recognise and accept her bona fides in this matter, but I have to disagree with Senator O’Reilly’s comment about this being a semantic point. It is a substantive point, not an interpretation of linguistics. It is a serious issue that goes to the core of why this committee was formed. I accept that there have been important add-ons in respect of other important work, but my willingness to sit on this committee was based on my understanding that it was never to have a post factum role. We are legislators. If someone wants commentary, he or she should go to The Irish Times, the Law Society Gazette or The Bar Review.

I hope the Minister of State can navigate through this. If anyone can, she can. I have great confidence in her. She has to respect the advice she received and I do not doubt that good advice was given in the best of good faith, but we are now in a serious quandary. There is a state of perplexity that could logjam us unless we navigate around it. This committee will become an evaluative talking shop, and that is not the intention of Senator Daly and others who fought for it for many years. Bizarrely, it was not the intention of the Government when it granted us our terms of reference either. There is often disagreement between the Houses on the separation of powers, but there now seems to be a disagreement within a power. To quote the record one last time, “Only the regulations when made by a Minister can be provided to the committee.” That is an accurate quote and I do not see a role for us unless we can overcome that. I am trying to be constructive and we will stay at this for as long as possible, but that is called “scuppering”. It is a fundamental scuppering of the terms of reference.