Joanna Tuffy (Dublin Mid West, Labour)

It was either Michael Marsh or Michael O'Farrell. His point was that rather than taking away from Members their local role as public representatives, that role should be enhanced because it informs their role as legislators and is valuable. This is the reason they are elected. The people elect politicians to represent them and Members should bring their knowledge of and empathy with their constituents to their work as legislators.

Although I qualified as a solicitor, I do not work as one at present and did not do so for very long. Consequently, the viewpoint I bring to legislation is that of a public representative for the people rather than that of a lawyer. This is the reason Members require the legislative expertise of the those in the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel and the barristers in the Office of the Attorney General.

Members also need the expertise of the Law Reform Commission. This issue was discussed during the debate on the last Bill and I formed the opinion that the Minister might have suggested that he did not intend to abolish it. I hope this is the case because the Law Reform Commission produces valuable work. I presume it had an input into this legislation and was consulted in this regard by the Office of the Attorney General. I have dealt with highly complex Bills drafted by the Law Reform Commission that I never could have drafted as a Deputy, including the Land and Conveyancing Law Reform Act that was passed just before the summer recess. In addition, the Law Reform Commission drafted the Bill that has been introduced into the Seanad on multi-unit dwellings and how to legislate for management companies of apartments and so on. This is a highly complex area of the law and the Law Reform Commission has done valuable work in drafting a Bill which can be brought to the Houses to enable Members to consider the practicalities as to how it will affect their constituents and those in their constituencies who live in apartments.

In this regard, statements have been made by a number of prominent people about the value of the work of the Law Reform Commission. For example, the High Court judge Ms Justice Mary Laffoy, spoke recently on the value of the commission's work in the context of the importance of law reform, especially when it involved the human person. She stated:

It can't be done on an ad hoc basis. Any diminution in or interference with the structure of the Law Reform Commission would be very short-sighted and will be regretted in 10 years' time.

She noted that as a judge and barrister, she had occasion to draw on the reports of the Law Reform Commission, which had created a huge reservoir of information on where the law stands. Another person who has spoken on the value of the Law Reform Commission's work is the Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr. James Hamilton. He observed that in the past, the State had paid through the nose for not keeping its laws up to date and stated that a great deal has been done by the Law Reform Commission. Moreover, it has been reported that Mrs. Justice Catherine McGuinness has complained and has stated that it was highly unfortunate that the McCarthy group had not spoken to the commission. She told The Irish Times that the commission already worked to a Government-mandated reform agenda and that each of its programmes of law reform was agreed with the Government. Moreover, I understand that the Law Reform Commission has stated that 70% of its reports end up in legislation. Consequently, its abolition would be very short-sighted. It demonstrates how such a one-dimensional approach was taken when the McCarthy report was drawn up. It simply considered how to save money and did not consider the other costs to society, were certain bodies to be abolished or were certain jobs or services within the public sector to be cut.

As for how legislation in this House is approached, the Bill is important in the context of streamlining legislation and eliminating unnecessary Acts from the Statute Book. However, there is a need to take a more strategic approach to legislation in this House in future. The manner in which legislation has been dealt with in recent years has been poor. While there have been periods during which no legislation passed through the House, they have been followed by periods at the end of a session when it is rushed through without an opportunity for Deputies and Senators to have a proper input into it. There should be a programme of legislation for the year and not simply a list of Bills issued by the Chief Whip, which sometimes ends up being essentially an aspirational document that bears no resemblance to reality in respect of the introduction of legislation. Members should know when they are going to deal with blocs of legislation in this House. Deputies should have plenty of time to prepare for debating on such legislation. The point made about the National Asset Management Agency Bill to the effect that its Committee Stage should be debated in this Chamber should apply to legislation in general because the media pay no attention to the legislative work carried out by the Dáil in the committee rooms. It would be better if it was done here because legislation would be seen to be done in public and could be reported on by the media.

I commend the work of the library and research team, which has started preparing summaries on the background to legislation. This is very valuable work by the library and research section, which I used when preparing to speak on this Bill. The document it produced was very informative about the background to this Bill.

I refer to regulation because this measure is part of the White Paper, Regulating Better. That White Paper incorporates a view of regulation and Deputies across the board have bought into the idea about regulation in recent years, but it has led to our economic crisis. We view regulation as a bad thing when we have too much regulation, or as a necessary evil to moderate excesses. That is a value-laden view of regulation linked to the view of light touch regulation where one should not interfere with business, which is part of the free market idea that has led to the collapse of our economy and all the land speculation and financial gambling that underpinned it. There was also the idea of individualism, acting for the benefit of the few rather than all of us as stakeholders in society.

We need a more positive view. The White Paper sets out six principles for better regulation but does not mention values. Laws are there to instil values in how we organise our society and our economy. When we implement laws and regulate it reflects the values of our society. We update laws to reflect modern values. Values are political and there are good and bad values. We have had too many bad values in much of the regulation of business over the past decade. Our legislation must incorporate good values concerning the common good, decency and how we look after and respect our fellow human beings. A core value we should insert in our legislation is equality, something that is in our Constitution and in the declaration of independence and the democratic programme. Core values from when we founded the State should inform our laws and regulation. We have had too many other values that failed us. One of these values was lauded by the former Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Michael McDowell, who spoke about inequality as being necessary and a good thing. So many of our policies in recent years have been about promoting inequality. Tax cuts and tax shelters favoured the most well-off to the greatest extent. We have had growing inequality. We have had many good things over the past 12 years but many laws and Government policies have underpinned inequality. In dealing with problems we must ensure that our laws and regulations underpin equality in our society and in our economy.

When we regulate for business, we should do so to ensure that business is done for the benefit of all of us as stakeholders in society. When business makes profit it does so at our expense, using our resources and our public services. The banks use our money, taxpayers' money. Will that be used for our benefit as stakeholders or for the shareholders of the bank? We must ensure that laws from now on benefit all of us as stakeholders and the common good. This legislation is valuable in tidying up the statute book but much work must be done in introducing new legislation in areas such as better regulation. We should have a new set of values for Irish society so that we do not get into this mess again.

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