Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I feel compelled to contribute because it seems from what we have just heard that this Bill is getting worse. My concern all along was that our Judiciary would be insulted as an unintended, or maybe intended in some quarters, consequence of the process of this Bill. What I have just heard goes further, in the sense that we are demeaning politics now as well. Under the structure or process we are setting up, the idea is that the Minister of the day will be no more than a convening messenger boy or girl who would not possibly have a view or intervene. I think we are undermining our own importance. As representatives of the people, we are well qualified and well capable of being involved in a process like this. We have views and, if we are lucky to get ministerial office, we have powers. While I like the idea of having lay involvement and a process in which names are suggested to the political system, I do not think we should inadvertently demean - "demean" might be too strong a word for what the Minister has just said - our own role. At some point, we have to stand up for politics.

If we completely undermine this House by providing for it to be no more than a talking Chamber, we will end up with no powers for ourselves. I do not think that would do our constitutional Republic any service. I like our Constitution. I like the balance that is struck in the testing relationship that exists between the Judiciary, the Executive and the Legislature here. We should not give up our right to have some role in the process. At the end of this long, convoluted and - it seems to me - incredibly distorted process, it should not be a mere box-ticking exercise that involves simply accepting what another committee has decided. We do and should have views and we should be willing to express them. For those reasons, I have to join others in opposing this amendment, which looks like it is going to fall. I do not agree with the Minister's suggestion that the Minister of the day should not have anything to say. I think the Minister of the day has every right to have an opinion. First of all, he or she might not necessarily get his or her view through the Cabinet. The Minister is not the only person with a say. The Cabinet should hold on to some powers. As politicians, we should hold on to some powers. We have a valuable role, which we should not throw away completely.

See this speech in context