Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)

I, too, commend my colleague Deputy Boyle on this Bill. There was an interesting article in The Irish Times on Saturday last. Ms Mary Davis, who was commissioned to look into the issue of active citizenship and return with a report, which I believe is due out tomorrow, stated in that short interview, as I am sure she will reiterate tomorrow, that when they went out and spoke to the public about how they perceive political life in Ireland, they found that the public was deeply cynical by international comparison and that in a sense they see the system as corrupt. This particularly relates to a dysfunctionality in local government. That has a considerable crippling effect in terms of the connection between citizens and the State in the sense that one does not have real power at local democratic level, which has an effect in terms of engendering such cynicism.

The Irish people are not stupid and they see it as it is, that the parties opposite have been so long in power that they have become corrupted by power, and that they appoint friends to bodies on the basis of medieval kings in their fiefdoms granting favours. While in many cases, as Deputy Boyle stated, people appointed are of the highest calibre and do a significant job, giving their time selflessly to such work, the cynicism among the public about the process is well justified because the system, as applied by the parties opposite, is clearly flawed and corrupt, or certainly corruptible. It is not just about politicians receiving favours in terms of money. The corruption can be in giving favours as well, where one might sanction a project that might use millions of euro of taxpayers' money favouring certain private individuals against civil servants' advice and without proper planning. Such favours and favours in terms public appointments are practices we need to stop.

We need to restore power, respectability, involvement and role to the committees of the House. The new committee proposed in the Bill is one that would raise the profile, stature, credibility, interest and calibre of the people who would apply for jobs on State boards. It is utterly sensible. It leaves the final say with the Minister, as is appropriate. We are not saying in the Bill that we should completely take away the role of the Minister in central Government in a directly-elected Parliament to make the final say, but it would be done in the full glare of public light and full analysis of the candidate's credentials. That can only be to the good.

One of the other aspects of the Bill I want to commend is the review of the number of public bodies we are creating. In various Bills I had a sense that we were setting up a public body to allow a Minister dish out an entirely new brand of favours. There are authorities for driver testing, taxis, aviation and transport. We could easily amalgamate those into a single authority and do away with the plethora of boards which the parties opposite seem to enjoy setting up.

Of course I also commend this Bill's requirement that the term of boards would be limited. There are many authorities in the enterprise area. Those in the research area include SFI, the HEA, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, the IDA, FÁS — one could continue the list. If one looks at the output, it is not evident.

We have passed Bills where two thirds of the provisions deal with the nice pension entitlements to be put in place for the members of the boards. Unsurprisingly, there is always one for the Progressive Democrats and whatever number for Fianna Fáil. That must stop. That cushy system of cronyism is not providing us with the best possible board structure. It is not carrying out a review of the strategic interests and vision of the people involved. I commend this Bill as a sensible, rational and reasonable approach to putting in place properly democratic systems for a democratic State.

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