Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I agree with what Deputies Ó Broin and McAuliffe said. The pace of change in the evolution of online platforms is such that we will not be in a position to wait two, three, five or ten years for a reappraisal of the utility and effectiveness of this legislation. It is an important start, but we have to remain ahead of the game and keep a watching brief on how the evolution of those platforms impacts on the way we do politics in this country, the way we campaign and the activities of citizens and others, especially those from outside the State, in that regard.

I welcome this debate, but I do not think it is a debate that we should have had to force, in essence. It became abundantly clear that the amendments tabled by the Minister of State for the select committee strayed well beyond the original intentions of the legislation as initiated and as debated on Second Stage a few weeks ago. For a long time my party, a party that is largely responsible for much of the ethical framework that now governs Irish politics and for the change introduced some years ago relating to corporate donations and so forth, has been campaigning and committed to updating and modernising the framework in respect of how we fairly finance politics in this country.

The rules we introduced about a decade ago succeeded in flushing big money corporate donations out of Irish politics to a real extent, but the bequest of cash and assets worth more than £2 million from the late William Hampton to the Sinn Féin Party and that party's acceptance of it exposed some of the frailties of our system and some of the anomalies that exist between both jurisdictions on this island. It appears that the Standards in Public Office Commission, SIPO, agrees. That was clearly outlined in correspondence it issued to the Labour Party in response to concerns we raised with it. It seems that a party that is registered and active in both jurisdictions can accept limitless amounts of cash in the North regardless of the restrictions here. I am not saying that as a criticism necessarily; I am saying it is a fact of life. That is the reality and it is incumbent on us as legislators and on anybody who wishes to see a more transparent system of politics and the financing of politics on this island to call that out and to propose solutions to what is a real problem. Frankly, I would not look to what I describe as the corrupt and amoral UK system of political financing to set a benchmark for the framework of ethics in politics in this jurisdiction.

The amendments from the Minister of State reflect some of the reforms that I proposed in my Second Stage contribution on this Bill. Little did I think that such extensive reforms would be proposed to be inserted into the legislation at this point, welcome as the amendments are in principle. The way in which the Bill has been wholesale amended with the intention of shunting it very hastily into the select committee, as we will do from this afternoon, is no way to do business. I hope the House will accept that. As I said on the Order of Business last week, these reforms are critical to the proper functioning of politics and of our democracy. The Dáil should have been given ample time to interrogate the proposals from the Minister of State properly. I accept we will do that on Committee Stage in the select committee and on Report Stage and that the process will be mirrored in the Seanad, but we should have been afforded the opportunity to have sight of the Minister of State's proposals on Second Stage.

We also did not have ample opportunity to propose amendments to the Minister of State's amendments. Two amendments have been circulated this afternoon. One of them is from me and one is from the Minister of State. That is an imperfect way of doing business late in the day. Quite frankly, it is unsatisfactory and it can lead to the making of bad law and to unintended consequences. Officials in the Department said at the very welcome briefing yesterday, which we all welcomed and found very useful, that many of the ideas reflected in the amendments came from the consultation that was undertaken with the political parties in 2021. That was an important consultation. However, if we are to accept that, surely we should accept that those changes should have been reflected in the initial Bill and not brought forward in such a hasty fashion.

In the short time I have left I will speak to some of the amendments. Bringing so-called subsidiary organisations into the ambit of the financing and donations sphere is very important, as is the requirement to declare all properties owned by political parties and subsidiary organisations and put them into the ambit of the system. We know that most wealth in this country is held not in cash but in assets, such as land and property. Where there are assets such as wealth in property there is wealth and that has to be recorded. We must be very clear about who owns those properties and assets. That is in the public interest. It is important, too, that annual statutory declarations will have to be made by party leaders and that these will include all donations from subsidiary organisations from outside the State. It is interesting that the Department confirmed in the briefing yesterday what I had suspected from my first reading of the relevant amendment, which is that this will not be governed by donation thresholds currently in place but instead it will apply to all donations in cash or coin from outside the State. That is an interesting proposal and I expect we will have some detailed debate about it. My understanding is that donations can still be made by citizens residing outside of the State in the normal way, once they are within the SIPO personal and corporate donations thresholds.

It is also very welcome that official accounting standards in terms of the recording and presentation of accounts will be required if the Minister of State's amendments are accepted, and I expect many of them will be. Again, this is very important for transparency and consistency. It will mean that every party will know what its obligations are, what the reporting and accounting standards are and, significantly and critically, the general public will be able to compare and contrast the financial position of each registered party. Nobody involved in politics in this country and nobody who is committed to democracy should fear transparency. I look forward to the debate on Committee Stage later today and throughout the week.

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