Mark Dearey (Green Party)

I second the motion. I want to address the issue of a cooling off period from the perspective of local government, which has been my touchstone since I arrived in this House for reasons which Members will appreciate. There are particular problems when people are moving from the public service to the private sector without any cooling off period, as is currently the case. It is possible that a person in a senior position can, when on extended leave of absence, establish a consultancy and present a report that can then be adjudicated upon by people who will be his or her juniors should he or she return to the previous position held in the public service. There are many anomalies. People in the public service can experience great difficulties in terms of dealing with former colleagues or recently departed colleagues in regard to planning matters in particular. A cooling off period is necessary. I take some issue with the period of one year which Senator Boyle considers to be enough. I appreciate, however, that we must be real about people's lives and that we cannot put them or their skill sets into cold storage, so to speak, on a long-term basis. The motion is about acknowledging that potential conflicts of interest exist and trying to create a period where this can be diluted, although the potential for conflict of interest never goes away entirely. We cannot legislate against people's right to employment in their area of skill and we need to find a balance between having a cooling off period and not creating complete inertia between the public and private sectors.

This extends in particular to very senior positions in local government, such as county managers who are particularly powerful individuals. I would argue that they are probably the most powerful group in local government. They enjoy very extensive powers which were extended in recent years and cause some resentment among councillors who have lost several reserve functions over the years. There is a range of areas in which county managers have exercised power and in which they could potentially work in the future, such as waste management. For reasons of confidence, transparency and reputation, I see a need for a cooling off period to be established and we propose this period to be one year.

With regard to reputation, I attended a meeting of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Economic and Regulatory Affairs at which a very interesting presentation was made by Grant Thornton on corporate governance in listed Irish companies. We urgently need to come up with an Irish code of corporate governance, given that the combined code of corporate governance we share with the UK is about to become the UK code of corporate governance. This will bring into sharp relief the fact that we have been using a combined code until now. Apparently we are the exception in the EU in that we lack our own specific corporate governance code for listed companies.

This issue is in the ether, so to speak, and I mentioned the subject matter of the committee meeting to highlight the issue of Ireland's reputation. At the meeting, representatives from Grant Thornton stated: "It is clear from reading the international press that governance scandals in Ireland, coupled with the severe downturn in our economy, have caused our reputation in international markets to suffer." I acknowledge this is strictly in the area of listed companies and our international reputation. In terms of tackling the entire area of governance of public and commercial life in this country, however, it is of a piece with what we propose.

The motion is also of a piece with an entire section of the renewed programme for Government negotiated last autumn. Section 8 on enhancing our democracy and public services proposes establishing an independent electoral commission and the publication of a White Paper on local government reform, which is due. It also makes proposals on politicians' pay, which has been addressed although perhaps not in the structured way we would have liked. None the less, it has been addressed and some of the heat has been taken out of the issue and some of the sense of scandal people felt has been addressed. The issue of public service reform in is the pot now and there are an enormous range of public sector reform proposals in the programme for Government, all of which I believe will contribute to a closer relationship between the people and their public service and to a more transparent public service which the people can see is working. If it is not working, people will have recourse for complaint. Other areas include hiring and promotion criteria to be reviewed by an independent body; the reform of the top level appointments commission which will address senior positions in the public and civil service; and the cooling off period.

The programme for Government commits to extending to all public servants in designated posts the provisions of the code of conduct for civil servants on the acceptance of outside appointments and of consultancy engagements following resignation or retirement to ensure they do not accept, within twelve months of resigning or retiring from the service, an offer of appointment from an employer outside the Civil Service or an engagement in a particular consultancy project, where the nature and terms of such appointment or engagement are deemed as possibly leading to or creating a conflict of interest, without first obtaining approval from the outside appointments board. The motion closely reflects that commitment in the programme for Government.

Without going into specifics I can think of several instances where public trust has been tested at the very least and possibly damaged by the indecent haste with which people with very confidential and commercially sensitive information can move without a cooling off period. We need to address this. Transparency International has written on this issue on a European-wide basis. It identifies many levels of corruption, and I use that word very advisedly because it is very easy to throw it around and very often it can do damage where damage should not be done. There are soft forms of corruption in public life and Transparency International identifies the issue of stepping down from a senior position and taking up a very prominent position on the board of a listed company, such as the example cited by Senator Boyle of Mr. Gerhard Schröder's move to Gazprom, which The Washington Post described as a sell-out. Transparency International states that Europe in general is not immune from this and that the European Union is very diverse and not free from corruption at all levels. It stated it found that, in western European Union member states, there is a grander, more private sector related type of corruption, and conflict of interest plays a role in this context. It cites examples of senior officials who, with indecent haste, find themselves on boards.

In recent days I raised this issue with regard to the move of the former Commissioner, Mr. McCreevy to Ryanair. I was puzzled as to how the ad hoc committee left it to himself to adjudicate on what he does or does not say or do. Given that the Commission's Internal Market division is investigating seven instances of arrangements Ryanair has with European airports, it is baffling. We should not have to look and wonder in these instances. We should have clear demarcation of one year and, beyond that point, there would be no cause for distrust, scandal and further corrosion of the very necessary relationship that exists between the public service and those it serves. Once that period would have passed, people would be free to do what they will as long as they would continue to respect the Official Secrets Act. I commend the motion and thank Members for their attention.