Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The commitment in respect of the guillotine stands. As I said yesterday, on a significant number of occasions there were no speakers where debates on Bills were listed to be shortened. I would be most willing to have a structure in the House whereby there would be breaks between Second, Committee and Report Stages and, if the people decide to abolish the Seanad later this year, there would also be a pre-enactment stage and a break between Report Stage and that stage. Other parliaments publish a full list of legislation for the year, but that would create many difficulties here because of the way things actually happen.

However, the Chief Whip will shortly bring forward a number of recommendations which will hopefully improve how the Dáil does its work. The Ceann Comhairle has many years of experience here and he had a number of very practical suggestions about this also. Many things have been tried over the years. Some have been good for a while but have then changed and not been as effective as people would have thought. The commitment in respect of having a more effective structure for dealing with legislation stands. The Chief Whip will bring forward a proposal on that in the not too distant future.

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