Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)

That is correct. They do not mind taking the €34,000 even though they are in the Technical Group, as they call it, but they still want to be Independents.

The chief executive, Mr. Coughlan, and the staff of this House are excellent. Every member of staff in this House is courteous and helpful and does an excellent job in a quiet and nice way. The staff are helpful and do the best they can for the Members. I compliment Mr. Coughlan and every member of his staff from the ushers to every worker in this House, including the cleaners who are here bright and early in the morning. They do a good job on behalf of this House and they should be complimented on that. They are pleasant people who work very hard and if the commission has any role in that area, I hope it will ensure they are paid very well because they are entitled to that.

I have no problem with the provision for translation services but I do not want to see Ministers avail of the services of the commission. They have their own budgets, offices and facilities. If one Minister succeeds in availing of commission services, all the other Ministers will do it. I am glad the Minister for Finance will ring-fence the money. I welcome the translation provision but Departments should not get involved in the work of the commission as the commission was set up to look after Members' interests only. We should not be afraid to look after Members' interests. Everybody else can look after their own interests.

The commission has been run very well. Deputy Paul McGrath, who is the Fine Gael representative along with Senator Ulick Burke, Deputy Howlin and the other people involved, have done an excellent job. It takes a lot of time and there is a good deal of work involved. When I represented Members before the commission was established we had many problems to deal with. I am glad the commission members have resolved many of those problems. They have looked after the best interests of Members. They should never be afraid to do that. The Executive has a job to do.

We are the elected Members, not the selected Members. We have enough of that in respect of what is happening in county councils. We have the selected county managers and the elected representatives. The power is being taken away from elected members. We must not let that happen in this House. At least we have this commission. We can run our own business and make our own decisions. I do not want any Ministers or Departments infringing on that. I want the commission to remain independent and look after the interests of this House. If it does that as well as it has done it in the past few years, there will be no problems. Some of the senior Ministers should examine the way it has run its business. It came in under budget and did an excellent job on behalf of the Members. I do not have any vested interest other than the fact that I am a Member of this House.

I thank the members of the commission who have done an excellent job. I publicly thank the chief executive, Mr. Coughlan, and his staff who do an excellent job in a courteous way. We may not be as courteous to them as we should be but they do the job well and I compliment them for that.

I welcome the Bill because it proves that the elected representatives are well able to run the business of the Houses. I know the Minister for Finance and his officials do not want to let any power go but that is something the Civil Service will have to learn. They want more power; they want to control the budgets, the Members and everything else. I am delighted we are taking away that control from them because they have enough to do. We do not want them to be concerned about our interests.

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