Brendan Ryan (Labour)

No. Senator Hayes did not move an amendment to the Order of Business on the issue of the Ombudsman. He asked the Leader about it. I leave the rail issue to my colleagues.

I ask the Leader for debate on a number of issues while there is not huge pressure of business. The first issue is that of privatisation on which the Leader is a national authority. The recent success of the ESB in America contrasts spectacularly with the abysmal failure of Eircom since privatisation. I hope ideological issues will not result in our having an extraordinarily successful State company privatised and ending up doing the kind of thing Eircom is doing to its customers. For example, Eircom has no longer a public office in the second city of the State. I invite the Leader to have a debate on the issue of privatisation of public services and utilities.

I also ask the Leader for a debate on the issue of race and immigration. Many of us are concerned that on the Fianna Fáil benches it is all right to use race and immigration as an issue to get oneself elected. The chairman of the Committee of Communications, the Marine and Natural Resources did so during the election and he was rewarded by being made chair of a committee. That is not the spirit in which many of us contested the election. We said we would not bring race or immigration into it. To reward the spectacular abuser of the issue with the chairmanship of a prestigious committee is an offence to those of us who kept our mouths shut. It is an offence particularly to members of Fianna Fáil in my constituency who had the courage to keep their mouths shut when their colleague was behaving disgracefully. We need a debate—