Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

He had earlier abolished the Free State Senate because it sought to prevent the implementation of key republican principles in the Constitution, but he restored it in the 1937 document. Eamon de Valera actively sought out different opinions and the record shows how he was respectful of other opinions. He even managed to handle with good grace the claim of James Dillon that he was introducing a dictatorship.

The record also shows how W. T. Cosgrave approached the creation of a second Chamber in a generous way. He consulted widely and absolutely understood that the new Senate would make Government control more difficult. In the manner in which he has prepared and introduced this amendment, the Taoiseach has departed from the tradition of openness and respectful consultation that defined the approach of his predecessors to the issue.

In the referendum on Oireachtas inquiries, the Government lost a measure that started with general approval because it showed contempt for anyone who opposed it. It refused to step away from a hyper-partisan campaign and got a stinging response from the people.

The Taoiseach knows that not a single person in this House or in Seanad Éireann is happy with the role of the Seanad. It is badly constituted and it has not been a dynamic presence in our democracy, but to try to construct a case whereby it has all of the ills of our country heaped on its shoulders is ridiculous, as is the refusal to acknowledge its many positive contributions to the State. Over many decades there have been reports recommending specific reforms and they have been ignored. I fully acknowledge that I and my party, just like the other parties here who have been in government, failed to act on the reports. We were comfortable just letting things proceed as they were. The failure to reform the Seanad before now is not the Seanad's fault; it is our fault in this House.

In a very bad sign of the approach the Government appears likely to take in this campaign, the Minister of State, Deputy Brian Hayes, wrote in the Irish Independent deliberately cherry-picking and misrepresenting my past comments, as the Taoiseach has done today. This empty opposition research is to be found in the Fine Gael notes for this debate. We will hear it repeatedly. This is what its members do every day. They have refused to acknowledge the context of the words they quote and refused to acknowledge the Taoiseach's stirring defence of the Seanad at the MacGill Summer School in Glenties.

In drawing up our manifesto for the last election, my party developed a series of proposals for reforming politics that were especially radical in terms of reform of the Oireachtas and the Government. We set out proposals for separating the core work of legislators and Ministers, opening up the political agenda and redirecting our work to be more strategic and expert-based. We stated that only in the context of these genuinely radical reforms would there no longer be a need for the Seanad. Members can write all the misleading articles they want but they will not find a statement from me in which I support the abolition of the Seanad without a fundamental constitutional reform of the Dáil and the Government. Since then, the Government has refused to consider any of the major reforms we proposed. More seriously, we have seen what happens when a Government has a majority so large that it can brush aside any uncomfortable questions.

It has become obvious that the single most important reform our politics needs is a parliament that has the capacity to act as a check on the Executive. We have a non-Executive Presidency, which serves us well and provides a focus of unity even at times of great division. Therefore, the need for a second Chamber, which has the potential to act independently of Government, has become clearer. The arrogant and unaccountable behaviour of the Government in Dáil Éireann has made the most powerful case for retaining a second Chamber of the Oireachtas. While the Government is again talking about reforming the Dáil in tandem with abolishing the Seanad, it has chosen to propose no change to the constitutional provisions relating to the Dáil. Therefore, the Government cannot deny that the proposal it wishes to put to the people is simply to abolish the Seanad and give its powers to an unreformed Dáil.

In recent weeks and again today, the Taoiseach has advanced a wide range of arguments for making more than 40 changes to Bunreacht na hÉireann in order to abolish the Seanad. It is worth taking the time to examine the major ones in order to see exactly how empty the case for this amendment is. The Taoiseach's most consistently used argument is that we should have only one House of Parliament because this is how most small and medium-sized countries in Europe do it. In particular, the Taoiseach has claimed that we would come into line with the practice in Nordic countries, whose standards of governance we should aspire to.

The truth is entirely different. The Government's proposal would give Ireland a parliamentary system unique in the world. No other country has one chamber of parliament combined with a non-Executive President, weak local government and total control by the Government of the agenda of parliament. The Nordic countries actually provide very strong arguments against what is being proposed. Not one of them has a parliamentary system that looks even vaguely like what the Government is proposing. Finland provides a good comparison. It has a unicameral system that is profoundly different from ours. While Finland has recently reduced its President's powers, he is still a principal leader in foreign affairs and has major influence on the government's formation. Finland has 200 Members of Parliament and a constitution that gives them powers beyond anything held by Deputies in this House. Key parliamentary committees have constitutional status and have built a long record of acting independently. They have never had a case of Government sources briefing against a committee chairman in a campaign to have him removed before an important investigation. The Finnish constitution also gives members of parliament specific rights to get information from any Government agency and it requires Ministers to attend for rigorous questioning when it is demanded by 10% of members of parliament. It would not be possible for a Finnish Minister to refuse to answer specific questions about the abuse of information given to him by the head of the police. Many parliamentary rules cannot be changed without broad consensus. In addition, it has strong local government with more councillors than we do and councils that control major areas of public spending and revenue raising. In the search for a justification for abolishing the Seanad and giving more power to a Government-dominated Dáil, no country in Europe or anywhere else backs up the Government's claims.

The evidence from abroad is that the Government should have less control, not more, as is now being proposed.

The Taoiseach has also stated the Seanad must be abolished because of its cost. At the launch of the amendment last week he and the Tánaiste claimed that we would save €20 million every year from abolition. This argument falls apart on basic examination. First and most importantly, nobody can doubt that the poor functioning of the Oireachtas was an element of the cause of the current crisis. Our work was not expert or strategic enough. In an economy of over €160 billion, with public expenditure of almost €55 billion, a properly functioning parliament is important economically. It can and should benefit the State and the economy in terms which would dwarf its actual annual costs. We must ensure we keep the costs of the Oireachtas as low as possible, but we must also ensure the Oireachtas is effective in its economic and fiscal work. Concentrating all powers in a Government-dominated Dáil is not the way to achieve this.

While the cost of a second Chamber of the Oireachtas can be justified in economic and fiscal terms, we cannot even trust the figures the Government provides for what these costs are. Last week the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste claimed that we would save €20 million per year if we were to abolish the Seanad. The evidence shows that this is untrue. The Accounting Officer, legally responsible for the expenditure of the Oireachtas, has stated the savings would be half the figure claimed. When a figure net of tax and other revenues is used, the savings are half again. Whatever way one examines the Taoiseach's claim of major savings from abolition, the facts do not support him.

On top of this, there is the cost of the referendum. In response to a question I tabled earlier this year the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Brendan Howlin, stated the cost of holding a referendum on one item, with no other election on the same day, was over €14 million. This referendum will not take one cent off the level of cuts to be imposed in the next three years. In fact, because the deficit targets are not being changed, it will increase the size of the required cuts by over €14 million. This is €14 million extra from schools, hospitals and policing at a time when every cent counts. If a primary concern of ours is to save the State as much money as possible in its time of greatest need, abandoning this referendum would be the appropriate start.

In a ridiculous comment last week the Taoiseach said we should abolish the Seanad because it had not stopped the financial crisis. As the man who was the leader of the largest Opposition party for the six years before the crisis, the Taoiseach was in a much stronger position to advocate alternative policies than any Senator. The record shows that he demanded even more spending, less tax and did not propose policies which would have avoided the crisis. In the years before 2008 Dáil Éireann spent more time debating a Fine Gael proposal on greyhound doping than debating financial regulation. The Taoiseach knows enough about the Constitution to know that the Seanad is precluded from having any power on matters of tax and expenditure. He is attacking it for failing to use powers it did not have.

The Taoiseach is also promoting a view of the Seanad as being without achievements. This is a travesty of history. During the years many distinguished Irish men and women have served in the Seanad and made a significant and positive contribution to Irish life. The Seanad has provided an essential forum for diverse opinions which would otherwise have had no voice in public life. On a more practical level, it has performed the role of a substantial contributor to legislation. The majority of Bills which the Seanad is empowered to amend are amended there. Equally, the Seanad regularly amends Bills which have already been passed by the Dáil. Only if one believes thousands of amendments have been irrelevant can one argue that the Seanad has failed to play an important role in legislation. The Government has made many empty claims during its term to date, but none can match the idea that halving the opportunities to review legislation will deliver better legislation.

I have never been a Member of the Seanad, but I brought a great deal of legislation through that House and have responded to many of its debates. Seanad debates are always more civil and generally more informed than those held in the Dáil. As a matter of course they discourage partisan comments.

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