Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)

I am also happy to contribute to the debate on this important Bill, which is a milestone, as it represents a stocktaking following the exploratory period of one of the most innovative initiatives of the Oireachtas in the management of its own affairs in the past three years. For many years, a number of us sought to establish independence for the Oireachtas from the heavy hand of the Department of Finance and to establish the proper status of our national Parliament as independent master of its own destiny so that it could disburse its own funding as it saw fit to serve Members and develop a modern efficient Parliament comparable to the best in the world. Every Member has had the privilege of witnessing how the best Parliaments work worldwide and viewing the IT and research facilities and support staff available to ensure proper accountability.

The House has two functions — to generate law and, equally important, to hold the Executive to account. Too often in the past Executives, including those of which I was a member, have viewed the Oireachtas as merely a rubber stamp for legislation and policy determined by Government. The committee system provides for the monitoring of each Department and it was important that the constitutional responsibility on us to hold the Executive to account should have been implemented efficiently. That could not be done on a shoestring and, therefore, resources were made available to augment the parliamentary staff. The commission has made a remarkable start in the three years of its existence to improve the library and research facilities. They have not been fully explored by all Members but extraordinary work has been undertaken by the current commission.

I pay tribute to the Ceann Comhairle who, as chairman of the commission, has steered this innovative new development over the past three years. I also pay tribute to my fellow members who, by and large, set aside party political considerations and worked in the interests of developing an effective Oireachtas, which is extremely important. I would also like to make favourable mention of the role of the Minister for Finance's representative on the commission. We were very fortunate that the Minister chose Deputy Brian Lenihan as his representative because his contribution as chairman of the finance sub-committee of the commission and his general input have been of a sterling order and he has maintained the primacy of the role of Parliament, on which we need to expand further. The initial grounding legislation could have gone further and, in truth, I would have liked this legislation to have gone further also. Prising open the fingers of the Department of Finance is a slow process, as officials here know, and it takes more than one attempt to succeed. We have now tried twice so perhaps at the third attempt, in three years' time, we may go further and gain a greater degree of independence. In this way the notional sanctioning by the Minister for posts and salary levels and the importance of the flexibility of the commission in regulating affairs in the interests of Members and the people will be better understood.

I welcome an tAire, Deputy Ó Cuív, to the Chamber and I am sure he takes an interest in the work of the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission and was not drawn here by the comments of my friend and colleague, the Fine Gael Party spokesperson.

Of the myriad of issues that presented themselves to the commission, the translation service was one of the few discordant issues. I had the privilege of being a member of the sub-committee that met the Minister and we were given firm commitments on the ring fencing of money. I agree with the sequencing presented by Deputy Paul McGrath and I understood there would be a ring-fenced subhead for additional costs incurred due to translation services. It is proper that translation be undertaken, but in the interest of transparency I understood, along the members and officials of the commission, that it would be a separate subhead. It has instead been subsumed into the commission's general running.

A letter of comfort was read into the record by Deputy Paul McGrath which states that, should the translation demand be greater than what was provided for, additional funding would be provided. I hope that when the issue of the funding package is addressed again in three years that commitment will have been met through a transparent, separate subhead, reimbursable on the basis of demand rather than subsumed into a general subhead.

Members of the commission, across all parties, seek the removal of translation services from the explicit core functions of the commission to its general functions. We have tabled an amendment in this regard, to which the names of commission members have been added. The commission has many important functions but its core functions are to provide for the running of the Houses of the Oireachtas and to have charge of the Houses of the Oireachtas. There are many other important functions, one of which is translation services. This issue represented an unfortunate interaction and was one of the few discordant episodes of the past three years.

The Minister of State at the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy Brian Lenihan, is correct that the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission has received a generous allocation for the next three years. Who knows what will arise? There may be a very large redundancy bill to be paid, depending on the expression of the love of the people in May, as my friend and colleague, Deputy Michael D. Higgins, says.

See this speech in context