Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

I take some comfort from what the Taoiseach has just said, although I am concerned that he is defining the interregnum period as just the period between the calling of the general election and the reconvening of the Dáil. In reality everybody knows the general election is going to take place - when it will take place is another day's work. The phrase being used today is "before the end of spring", which could be the end of April. Last week we were led to believe it would take place by the end of March. In December it was supposed to be the end of January. The general election date is a moving target. The reality is that we are in that interregnum period.

I know there is always argument about what political appointments are being made, who is being appointed and so on. However, there is also the very real issue where appointments are being made - I am thinking in particular of chairs of State bodies and so on who have a significant role to play in the running of the State apparatus. In many cases appointments made now could last for five years - in effect the entire lifetime of a government. Unless we have an all-party agreement on appointments to be made between now and the reconvening of the Dáil, a new government might find itself having to ask new appointees to voluntarily resign so that the new government would be in a position to make appointments. It is undesirable that people who are now being asked to serve on boards would be put in that position by the present Government. There is a way to avoid that by agreeing a cross-party mechanism for clearing or agreeing. There would not be any great difficulty with nominations from designated bodies to various boards and so on. In many cases where Ministers are exercising discretion there may be no argument and the appointee may be perfectly appropriate and agreed. However, in cases where there is disagreement, it would be better to have that addressed on a cross-party basis rather than having appointments made that may need to be undone after the general election.

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