Eoghan Murphy (Dublin South East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I too congratulate the Minister on introducing this Bill. It is about time action was taken to regulate and bring greater transparency to lobbying. Lobbying is part of political life and is not inherently bad. Ensuring that different voices are heard is an important function of democracy.

However, when something like lobbying is not done openly, it undermines our democracy. Exactly the same sentiments can be expressed concerning appointments to State boards. Recent events have not cast politics or my own party in a good light. I am ashamed that my party did not move more quickly to fully reform the area of board appointments, as we promised. Old habits die hard, but now at least it would seem this old habit has suddenly died very quickly, and rightly so. It should not have had to happen this way. We should have had the courage of our convictions. That perhaps is the greater failing in recent events. The important fact to take from all of this is that in our commitment to have all board appointments now made through the public appointments system, a cultural problem inherent in the practice of politics in this country since the foundation of the State has been eradicated overnight. I do not welcome the events that brought us to this point, but such change is welcome. The Minister has moved swiftly to bring in this change. He has seen the opportunity in this crisis and I congratulate him for that.

It is also welcome that we are now moving to bring some regulation and transparency to the area of lobbying. I have been lobbied on the Bill, which I have read in detail. It is an important first step. We need to move together to enact it as quickly as possible. We should use it as a foundation on which to build in order to continue to bring greater transparency and regulation to this area of political life.

I wish to raise a couple of points which I hope we can debate on Committee Stage in order to get further clarity on them. Under the legislation, lobbyists are required to register. However, my understanding is that the civil servant, adviser or other person being lobbied has no obligation to ask if the lobbyist is registered. Such an obligation should be put in place. There has to be a balance between the lobbyist and the person being lobbied to ensure that things are done in accordance with the new law. It is my understanding that the person can still be lobbied even if he or she knows the lobbyist is not on a register. I think that is a mistake. If that is the case, it also needs to be amended.

Under the terms of the Bill, categories of people included as the lobbied include Secretaries General and assistant secretaries, along with their equivalents on local authorities. I wonder if we are pitching this too high in terms of responsibilities. An assistant secretary has a huge amount of work coming across his or her desk and cannot always be on top of all the details. I wonder, therefore, if we might include one or two levels below, just as a safeguard. If they were excluded because it was felt they were not relevant for lobbyists, there should be no harm in including them.

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