Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)

Not so. I can assure the Ceann Comhairle that people may not even agree with what I have to say. If the Government wanted to eliminate the legislative backlog the Taoiseach could announce that he was willing to give up the Government monopoly on the initiation of legislation and allow legislation to be initiated by the Opposition and in committees. I am not going to develop this point because instead of going down that road we have a rather ill-informed rush to change the electoral system. What is the reasoning behind this? It is not to change the legislative process. I am just noting this point.

I refer to a seminal paper prepared by former Attorney General, Mr. David Byrne, which ruled that Ministers in delegating functions to bodies such as the HSE or any other body, did so in an explicit policy envelope and could not legally, under the Constitution, devolve any function they held as Minister other than that which was specified in the Act appointing the particular body to which delegation was made. This should inform the notion-----

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