James Bannon (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)

This is an emergency legislative measure to allow the Competition Authority to function with the required number of members. As stated, it will amend section 35 of the Competition Act 2002 to allow for the appointment of temporary members to the Competition Authority. I believe it is necessary we avoid legal challenges to its decisions. These measures will remain in place until such time as all current vacant positions are filled. The appointment by the Minister of a temporary chairperson prior to the debate on this Bill is an example of the Government's reliance on retrospective legislation. Was it necessary to put the cart before the horse, which is what the Minister did? The Minister made the announcement in respect of that appointment only seven days ago. Could that appointment not have waited until after this debate?

The question that must be asked in the context of this legislation is why there are a number of vacancies in the authority. Is the loss of members due to natural wastage or is there another reason which is being kept under wraps by Government? I would like the Minister to respond to that question this evening. There may be a common cause to a number of people leaving an organisation at the same time. If so, we need to know this.

A number of authority members are due to leave to take up new positions and others have reached retirement age, which is relevant in all areas except politics where often people are permitted to remain on forever. There is in place legislation which states that people must retire at a certain age. I am aware that a number of managers and directors of services in my own county retired having reached the age limit set down in this regard. The legislation dealing with ageism allows people to continue in employment for additional years.

As a result of vacancies, the authority will soon be unable to meet its statutory requirements of having in place a chairman and a minimum of two full-time members. While it is impossible to make provision for an unexpected resignation surely it is possible, even for this Government, to predict a retirement. The Government has informed us it would take too long to organise a public appointments competition and to find people of the necessary calibre required to fill the vacancies in the Competition Authority. However, it is not good enough that this situation, which now requires emergency legislation, was allowed to develop in the first instance. The Government has a responsibility to ensure that full-time members are available to such authorities. This is an indication of just how paralysed and out of touch this Government has been for the past number of years. What we need in this country is a general election and a clear-out of tired, jaded Ministers. There is much public anger in this regard. The bottom line for many people is to see this Fianna Fáil-led Government go out of office. It has been in situ for 20 of the past 22 years and nothing appears to be going right for it because it is not tuned into what it should be doing. This Government is a big disappointment to the nation. There was much hullabaloo and spin when Deputy Bertie Ahern took over the Fianna Fáil Party. The spin continues in this Government.

See this speech in context