Seanad debates

Tuesday, 9 December 2003

Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) (Amendment) Bill 2003: Second Stage.

 

The legislation will be important and assist the tribunal's work and I hope we do not have to wait 20 or 30 years for the tribunal to complete that work. Tribunals are established to find out what happened on a particular issue and make recommendations for change. The longer it takes for this to happen, the less valuable is the work. The Tribunal to Inquire into Certain Planning Matters and Payments has done much valuable work and we have already learned a great deal from its interim report. The process has changed politics too and the many recent changes and reforms in that arena are probably due to the revelations that have both given rise to the tribunals and been produced by them. My party and others introduced some of these reforms. Public funding of election campaigns, disclosure requirements, and the Freedom of Information Act are recent innovations.

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