Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Well, wherever. They should be down with the successor of my own townsman, the late Dice Man.

We are leaving here today and we do not know either the charge or the allowance. Deputy Naughten has sought certain assurances. When calculating that allowance, certain consideration should be given to families that have members with disabilities. It should not be a simple head count, but should depend on the categorisation of people. If people are affected with a disability, a certain allowance should be made for that. The issue has been raised with me.

In ten or twenty years time, this country will not be metered. I see Deputy Bannon up there in the back benches. He is a man with his finger on the pulse and is in touch with his people. I can guarantee that by this time next year, he will have spent several nights in the Marquee in Drumlish trying to explain to his constituents how these charges came in. He will explain that he had no role in it, that he has no power, and that he did not know that this was going to happen. We are signing over power to an unaccountable body. Let us leave out unelected; it is unaccountable. We are the people responsible for doing it. The Deputy has a big issue in his constituency with wind turbines, but we are doing the exact same thing, writing the same script for another body with the same principle. We will go back to our constituents and bemoan the fact that it has happened, yet here we are participating in it.

This legislation is deeply flawed. It is symptomatic of the flaws in this House and in our democratic process. The Dáil is not making the Government accountable. This Government pays scant regard to the will of the Dáil. One of the difficulties of having a large majority is that the Dáil has become a rubber stamp. I previously mentioned the Smithwick tribunal report and the debate on the Seanad referendum. Nothing has happened on them. It falls on deaf ears. I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for his indulgence. This legislation will cause trouble for a long time due to the very clear and obvious flaws that have been pointed out here today.

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