Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am told principal officers and assistant principal officers regularly accompany Ministers to the Dáil and have a key interaction with what is going on, and they should be included also.

There is a suggestion that the private secretaries to Ministers should be included also because they can have a key role in setting up meetings, encouraging meetings to take place or discouraging meetings. I was never a Minister. I do not know how strong a private secretary can be but I am sure some private secretaries can get their Minister to meet an individual if they believe it would be worthwhile to his or her Department. There is a case to be made in that regard.

I refer to all the people who are lobbyists but who do not have to list their social contacts. The Minister excluded the Frank Flannerys of this world from the legislation. I come back to my opening sentence about the inside track. The people want to be assured there is not an inside track for the 1% of people concerned as opposed to the other 99%. He had an inside track. I will not demonise the man but the case was publicised. I mention him because the Minister's former ministerial colleague, Deputy Ruairí Quinn, said about him earlier this year that he was always around the corridors and that he could lobby in a non-lobby kind of way. He would chat to one and tell one what he wanted done. He would say he was not there to lobby one but one would get the point he was making. The former Minister said Frank Flannery was capable of lobbying in a non-lobbying kind of way. It is a lovely phrase. It is probably an Irish way of putting it but everyone understood that. It might not be the Queen's English but Irish people understood what that meant. We have to deal with that.

In a way, because of what is omitted, the legislation is a bit of a fig leaf because it is narrow. I have listed the areas I want included, and the people will see that. They want high standards and ethics in politics. I have been canvassing in the by-election in recent days and people are shocked. They thought we had a change in Irish society but they said that when it comes to this issue this crowd are worse than us.

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