Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

These questions are about the possible revision of the code of conduct for officeholders, which the Standards in Public Office Commission, SIPO, has been seeking for some time. The Taoiseach's response to this is that when the Ethics in Public Office (Amendment) Bill 2007 is passed, he will review the code with SIPO. The legislation has been around a long time. It was first announced by the Taoiseach's predecessor, Deputy Bertie Ahern, and the then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Michael McDowell, on the steps of Government Buildings in the autumn of 2006 following the disclosure that the former Taoiseach had received some payments while he was Minister for Finance from friends, associates and so on. It became known as the dig out Bill and it was introduced by the present Taoiseach when he was Minister for Finance.

It is intended under the legislation that if one is an officeholder and somebody offers one a gift, one would go to SIPO to check whether it is all right to accept the gift. The Bill was passed by the Seanad but we have not seen sight of it since, as it was never introduced in this House. When will it be brought into the House? If we have to wait for the review of the code of conduct for officeholders until that Bill is passed, we will be quite a while waiting because it has been going on for four years. What will happen to that legislation? Is it still the Government's intention to have it enacted? Can he give us some idea when it might be enacted in order that we can get some idea as to when he will consult SIPO about changes to the code of conduct for officeholders?

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