Derek McDowell (Labour)

This is genuinely a very bad day for democracy. I heard Senator Quinn's very eloquent contribution and I wholeheartedly agree with his argument.

Senator Dardis made a very interesting point which bears some deliberation. We have inherited the British way of doing things. Our Civil Service and system of government was given to us by the British and we have stuck pretty rigidly to it for 70 or 80 years. It is a system where civil servants talk to civil servants, civil servants talk to Ministers, Ministers sometimes talk to each other and eventually a decision comes down from Cabinet. The singular feature of all this talking is that it all happens – at least in theory – in private and in secret. In theory, the public is not meant to find out anything until 30 years after the event.

It is a system of government and a use of power that most of us recognise but few of us would seek to defend. Those in whose name power is wielded are kept in ignorance of the reasons why a particular decision was taken, about the lobbying for a decision or the pressure brought to bear on Ministers about a decision. Freedom of information has played its part in opening up our system of government. The committee system in these Houses has also played its part. Ten or 15 years ago there was no committee system and there was certainly no inquiry system in the committees of these Houses. I suspect that 15 years ago very few people would have known the names of the Secretaries General of the various Departments. They did not appear before committees or on television. They sat in their Departments and made decisions.