Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The fifth. No, it is the fifth column the Deputy is talking about. Some of them are fifth columnists alright. They also require additional supports and access to help them do the work we want them to do. We should facilitate that. We should look again at having dedicated weeks, such as on issues pertaining to the Six Counties, the Irish language - as I have proposed before - or even the EU. There is also the matter of access to speaking times for MPs from this island, MLAs or MEPs.

There are changes which would affect the Opposition. There is a proposal to reduce speaking times in order to be more efficient in the use of our time and to ensure that we are not waffling on and on, as politicians are often accused of, myself included. Sometimes we have to curtail our speeches and get our point across in less time.

Another suggestion is to look at removing the privileges from former Members. In my view, if we are seeking to be a Republic, that suggests that citizens are equal. If citizens are equal, former Members should not enjoy privileges after their term of office is over. That might be controversial with the former Members but it is one of the things we should look at. We should also look at how we deal with the whole issue of political reform. One of the issues we debated in the sub-committee, but on which did reach agreement as it was not within our gift, was how to deal with the restriction placed on Members with regard to the proviso on amendments which have a financial charge on the Exchequer and on the people. That would require a constitutional change and I believe we should come back to that at a future Dáil reform committee or at another constitutional convention. It remains an issue despite the fact that the Constitutional Convention addressed it and suggested it be removed.

Some of the issues we addressed were ones my own party and I put forward, such as the independent budgetary office, which we suggested a number of years ago in a pre-budget submission. I believe it would be a useful tool for all parties to be able to cost proposals which we come up with. Members of the public are often very innovative in what they suggest to us. Sometimes we would say a suggestion is beyond our remit and we are unable to cost it. With this proposal, we might have some mechanism to cost it. We could then see how feasible it is in terms of our budgetary consideration. The new budget oversight committee, once established and up and running, would be a useful tool to deal with the proper scrutiny of budgets and estimates, which we have not managed to do properly in this House, despite changes in the last term that we did not manage to fulfil. I believe our mandate to the oversight we need to have over one the key elements of parliamentary procedure, which is the-----

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