Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Taoiseach his plans to carry out a review of the capacity of the Office of the Attorney General. [50986/12]

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Office of the Attorney General is organised into two legal areas: the advisory side, which provides legal advice, and the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel, which drafts legislation. The number of staff working in the Office of the Attorney General is regularly reviewed to ensure that there are sufficient resources available to carry out the necessary functions of the office, specifically the provision of legal advice and the drafting of legislation. If, in the context of the volume, urgency and complexity of work being sought, the senior management of the office concludes that additional resources are required, an appropriate business case is made to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. If the Department agrees with the case, additional staff are sanctioned and recruitment takes place.

Arising from business cases put forward in August 2011 and September 2012, seven new permanent legal staff have been authorised. One is engaged on advisory work; one, a legislative editor, assists drafters with their work; and the remaining five persons are all drafters, four of whom are already in place, with another one expected over the coming months. Further, in the context of the Croke Park agreement review mechanisms, the office regularly reviews its progress and updates its targets and objectives.

Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I welcome the news that additional staff have been allocated to the Attorney General's office, because the Taoiseach has said in the past that there were pressures on the office due to the demands of the EU-IMF programme. He said it in respect of necessary legislation on domestic violence and the necessary recognition of collective bargaining rights for workers, both of which are being delayed due to the pressures of the EU-IMF programme. Could the Taoiseach give us some sense of whether this remains a problem and whether the provision of new staff means that we will have legislation on these two issues or indeed on the failure thus far to provide for free GP care for those on the long-term illness scheme?

The Supreme Court judgment on the McCrystal case in respect of the children's rights referendum led to some critical comment, including some from the Taoiseach's backbenchers, about the role of the Attorney General. The Supreme Court found that the Government publications during the referendum had breached the McKenna principles and were not fair, equal, impartial or neutral. This was a very significant judgment. As the Taoiseach knows, Government spending has been raised in previous campaigns and has been a continuing cause for concern. As I understand it, the Attorney General signed off on the final working text in the Government's information booklet and website. Is that the case? Who made the decision to produce a Government booklet on the referendum rather than leave that work to the Referendum Commission? Did the Government seek advice from the Attorney General on the legality of this and has that practice been ended in light of the Supreme Court judgment?

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Attorney General of the day advises the Government appropriately in regard to any referendum. In this case the High Court gave its decision and was very clear in its judgment. The Supreme Court gave a different view shortly afterwards. The Supreme Court is the ultimate determining body for the constitutionality of our legislation, and the Government accepted that and reacted to its decision quickly. We need to discuss the question of holding referendums and what the Government can and cannot do. Elements arising from the McKenna judgment of years ago limit the process of explaining what the referendum is about. In preparing for future referendums we need to have a clear view of the steps the Government must take in introducing legislation to give effect to a Bill to hold a referendum. The process of seeking advice and guidelines from the Attorney General is important. The process by which anybody in the country has the right to appeal that to a court, and on to a higher court if necessary, always stands. This year there will certainly be one referendum, if not more.

The Constitution Convention made several decisions a couple of days ago and I await its report. The question relating to the Office of the Attorney General deals with the extent of staff there. In responding to earlier questions I spoke about the process of provision of legislation in general and that has obviously been taken into account here. There are 57 permanent and four contract administrative posts in the Office of the Attorney General, eight contract employees, four staff in the Attorney General's office and four legal researchers. A review took place and the extra staff were provided because of the current position arising from the exceptional requirement for legislation driven by troika demands to meet our programme requirements and due to pressure from different Departments and Ministers to get necessary legislation through.

One of the real challenges facing the Government is to give impact to legislation that will affect the creation of jobs, and even that gets pressurised in the bottleneck at the end. It is a case of hoping that the employment of extra staff will result in a greater throughput of Bills that will give effect to necessary legislation. It would be opportune to review how this process works in the first place in order to achieve better co-ordination and results from people who are experienced but who might be working in unconnected sectors until the end, when all the paperwork must be squeezed through the Parliamentary Counsel process. I intend to speak to the Attorney General about that, which might result in a better output.

Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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There are two different issues here. I very much welcome the appointment of additional staff to the Attorney General's office and I hope it will mean that really important legislation on domestic violence, workers' rights to collective bargaining and free GP care for those on long-term illness scheme will come forward quite quickly and bring results. On this issue results will count. I presume, based on the Taoiseach's answer - this almost brings us back to the last question, because he never gave me a clear answer - that the Attorney General did sign off on the final wording of the text in the Government's information booklet and website. The Taoiseach should take the opportunity to say he will institute changes in how the Government interacts with the people in the course of a referendum campaign, given the Supreme Court judgment that the Government breached the McKenna principles and was not fair, equal, impartial or neutral.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I do not speak for the Supreme Court, which is the ultimate body in determining what is and is not constitutional. In this case the Government accepted the decision of the Supreme Court and acted swiftly to see that it became a reality. A short time before that, the High Court had made its view very clear that the Government had acted appropriately and followed proper procedure.

There is a requirement to deal with necessary changes to the Constitution, whether these arise from changes in competence in Europe, with regard to other issues such as a requirement for a simple referendum on universal patents, or with whatever the Government may decide following recommendations from the constitutional convention. We have already decided to have a referendum on the abolition of the Seanad. In all such cases a process must take place and the Government must reflect on how to get this process working effectively so citizens are properly and fully informed and can make their decision in the knowledge they are the ultimate arbiters and owners of Bunreacht na hÉireann, on which they alone will make decisions. It is important that the Government, which produces Bills that propose changes to the Constitution, should have a process by which all these matters can be explained properly and comprehensively to the citizens.

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The McKenna judgment on referendums does not limit the capacity of Government to explain an issue; it limits its capacity to use taxpayers' money to advocate on one side or the other. There is a crucial difference. The Supreme Court made a definitive judgment regarding the Government's mishandling of the children's referendum and many questions remain to be answered in that regard. The House has not had an opportunity to hold the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Deputy Frances Fitzgerald, accountable in regard to what went on.

I refer to the last question which, again, required freedom of information requests and information gleaned thereby in order to discover that the Attorney General had corrected aspects of the Government material which subsequently was changed again, but we do not know how. Two Ministers, Deputies Varadkar and Fitzgerald, suggested the Attorney General had got it wrong - they dumped on her. The Minister, Deputy Varadkar, commented at the time that legal advice can be wrong. It was wrong but we found out through the freedom of information process that in at least one instance the Attorney General had given the correct advice, which was not followed.

In the context of future referendums, and in reviewing the Office of the Attorney General, would the Taoiseach consider that advice of the Attorney General, or any material produced by that office, should be published and made transparent? We could then see whether such material has been over-politicised by Ministers of the day, contrary to advice received from the Attorney General's office. Traditionally the Attorney General does not articulate publicly on matters of this kind. Today there is silence from the Office of the Attorney General in regard to the entire process leading up to the publication of material on the Government website. This is very unsatisfactory. Given this silence confidence in the Office has been undermined, inadvertently or otherwise, by two Ministers, which is not a good thing. We need to find out what happened in the lead-up to that referendum and why the issue was over-politicised and over-sold, unnecessarily.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I do not agree that all or any advice from the Office of the Attorney General should be published.

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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I refer just to referendums.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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This has been the procedure in the House for a very long time and for very good reason. The Minister, Deputy Fitzgerald, was very upfront in dealing with the children's referendum, all the preparations and the way in which information was dispensed. When this process was challenged, legitimately, in the High Court that court gave its view. This was appealed to the Supreme Court which also gave its view, namely, that the Government was not fully in accordance with the Constitution. The Government accepted that and immediately acted accordingly.

Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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We have spent 55 minutes on four questions tabled by two Deputies, which leaves five minutes. If this session finishes peremptorily the next tranche of 38 questions on the North, concerning extremely important issues, will be dealt with in five minutes. Something must be done to rationalise this situation. If we go to the next tranche the Taoiseach's reply will take up all the time available and there will be no time left for supplementary material in regard to the many important Northern Ireland issues. I will ensure that does not happen.

I have some relevant questions on Question No. 4 regarding the review and capacity of the Office of the Attorney General. The Taoiseach spoke on the McKenna judgment and his desire to row back on it. Is he not being opportunistic in the extreme in regard to this? As has been noted, members of the Government can argue anything they want, 24 hours a day. Nobody is stopping them, they can take to the hustings and put forward every argument in the book. However, is it not the case that what the Taoiseach wants is public funds to finance such Government spin rather than have members of Government do the same as members of the Opposition, or as citizens have the right to do - go out and argue their case?

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy himself is one for spin.

Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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How can the Taoiseach justify such a situation? I put it to him there would be great anger and resistance among civil society if he tried to do so.

Is it the case that staffing limits are having a severe effect in many areas of Government, including in the Office of the Attorney General? For example, why is it taking so long to have concrete proposals on the Taoiseach's pledge to abolish the Seanad? There should at least be an outline draft of the legislation that would be needed in this regard. Does this reflect capacity problems in the Office of the Attorney General, or is the Senators' rearguard action to try to protect that institution, which has no use or purpose, winning the day with the Taoiseach?

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I never said anything about rowing back on any judgment but stated the Supreme Court would make its decision and that it is the ultimate determining body in respect of the Constitution. I accept that, as both Head of Government and as a citizen. In the case of the children's referendum, the Government immediately accepted the decision of the Supreme Court and set about implementing it. I stated it was my view that elements of the Supreme Court decision on the McKenna judgment case, which was a perfectly legitimate case to take, are very narrow and that in the case of future referenda we need to be clear that when Government proposes the holding of a referendum the process of preparing the Bill required and of conveying the information to citizens is as clear, thorough and as comprehensive as can be.

What was the last point raised by the Deputy?

Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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The Seanad.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I have answered Deputy Martin's questions on this matter. This legislation will be published in the next session. It is practically complete and we will have a good debate on it when it comes to the House. I hope that is not too much of a rearguard action.