Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House. It was encouraging and important that the Bill was initiated in this House, and it was addressed very well at that stage.

I welcome the requirement of the Minister to identify the qualifications and suitability of candidates for nomination to the board and to indicate those suitabilities to the joint committee and vice versa. However, I still believe there is an omission in the section to the extent that the Minister did not accept our idea of a public hearing by the joint committee on the board members. While the committee can recommend names, the Minister selects the candidates. The merit of a hearing would be that it would ensure transparency and accountability and that it is not a case of party personnel being appointed for the sake of it. Given that public moneys are involved and that high competency levels are required, this is an important consideration and there was an opportunity to include it. I register my happiness that certain amendments allow for the Minister to declare competencies but I am unhappy with the fact that there will not be full hearings as these could have avoided anything extraneous to their competency for membership of the board. This is a missed opportunity as it would have gone a long way to allay public cynicism and alienation which sometimes exist towards the process of politics and government. It was important to display that we do not appoint party hacks. The Minister was given a great opportunity with a revolutionary concept in an Irish context and it is regrettable he did not take it. I do not know if procedures allow the Minister to rethink that decision.