Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Parlon. I broadly welcome the Bill. I feel a need to discuss decentralisation as the Joint Committee on Finance and the Public Service was censored from having a debate on it by a recent vote of Government, which was quite appalling. The Minister of State was equally bemused by this, as I put the question to him. He assured me he was quite happy to debate the issue at any stage. While this is not the appropriate time to go into this in great detail, it is important to recognise that decentralisation could go the way of e-voting and dormant accounts, namely, a great idea destroyed in the implementation.

I have listened to the points made about decentralisation. I find myself closer to Senator Mansergh's view on this than that of Senator McDowell.