Alex White (Labour)

I am reasonably certain. I may be less certain about a by-election than some other things. I am looking forward to many things. Of course we would prefer to be considering an actual proposal of legislation rather than stating we look forward to it. I agree with Senator Twomey on that point that it is harmless enough. From the point of view of it facilitating a discussion, I am prepared to accept it is a good thing to do.

The point made by Senator Ó Brolcháin really gets to the heart of the matter. He said that much of this depends on personal integrity, which is absolutely the case. There are people in the public service, in politics and in public life generally upon whom the public rely and in whom they repose a tremendous amount of trust. There is a very high expectation of people. Those people, including us, are expected to have a moral and ethical compass. That is an expectation that goes with the job. It is not something that can be imposed through arbitrary limits or arbitrary rules, much as I believe that certain rules are important. We have seen a breakdown in trust in many areas. I want to support and build on a Civil Service in which we have a great level of trust. I still have a very high level of trust for civil and public servants, including public servants with whom I have worked in local authorities. They make an enormous contribution. Pretty much all of those with whom I have had any contact are people of very high integrity and often of very high expertise who need support, and often more training and skills. The Independent Senators' amendment is not all that far removed from what we are discussing. We want a level of training, skills and education, particularly educational qualifications when they are appointed to senior positions. We need to be able to trust people and going with that is an ethical core which we expect of people and which we largely get.

The motion refers to the "reviewed Programme for Government". I presume the motion was intended to refer to the "renewed programme for Government". That is just one of the many things that needs to be addressed. I agree with Senator Twomey that we cannot divorce this measure from matters like a register for lobbyists, for which my party has pressed for many years. There has been disgraceful backsliding on the freedom of information legislation. If the Green Party in government is serious it should be demanding that those reverses are changed. There is a need for whistleblower legislation, on which the Labour Party has also made proposals. That is what we want to see happening. We do not want just to look forward to it; we want to see it actually happening.

The issue of a cooling off period affecting the legislation we are discussing here would be a matter of negotiation and discussion with the public servants concerned. However, it cannot be that complex in the greater scheme to amend this legislation and add a list of designated posts to those already covered by the code of conduct. As the code of conduct already exists, it is simply a matter of extending it to new groups of people and offices. Obviously we are at some disadvantage having not heard what the Minister of State proposes to say in the debate. If I do not have the opportunity to hear him in the Chamber owing to another commitment, I look forward to reviewing his contribution later. I would like to see some commitment from the Government to bring forward legislation on this issue, which does not seem to be enormously complicated if there is a political will to deliver it.

I referred to an arbitrary limit. A one-year limit is proposed here. In 2007 my party's manifesto proposed a two-year cooling-off period. Senator Ross made a point on integrity that I intended making myself. When a limit of one year or two years is set we need to be careful not to send out a signal that at the end of that period there is an unleashing of practically anything that the individual can do. That cannot be right. The Minister of State will correct me if I am wrong in this. I believe the persons who are required to adhere to the Official Secrets Act have a continuing requirement into the future. There can be no temporal limit to a person's responsibilities under the Official Secrets Act. That is akin to the common law duty of confidence in ordinary private sector employment, which continues into the future. One cannot be revealing secrets or matters that have come to one's attention that were germane to the work one did in a Department or local authority if they are covered by the Official Secrets Act. That covers the individual permanently. Similarly in the private sector, every employee has a duty of confidence to his or her employer which extends into the future. We need to ensure there is a very high expectation of people into the future, notwithstanding that the one-year or two-year period has expired.

On the duty of confidence, Senator Ó Brolcháin made the point about planning and local authorities. This is probably where this risk has arisen in its darkest. There is a perception that if there has not been abuse, at least there is a risk of abuse. It would be absolutely unacceptable and it is probably axiomatic that, for example, a director of planning in a local authority might retire and go on to work on the same file on which he or she had been working while director of planning. While I do not know the actual regulation preventing that happening, it would be extraordinary if that were to occur. It seems to me it simply could not occur. I do not know the precise code of conduct or what prevents that happening. It would seem to almost go without saying that somebody could not turn around and work on that file. I do not know the mechanism of how that is restricted, but I presume it is restricted.

However, a director of planning might retire and while he or she does not work on the same file on which he or she was making decisions last week, he or she uses the expertise he or she has built up over the years. Ultimately there is not very much we can do about that. People pick up expertise in all areas of work in which they are involved and it inheres in them. They have just developed this expertise and knowledge. It is not possible to take it away from them. There is a grey area in trying to distinguish a real conflict of interest, which is a risk, and people being free - because we cannot stop people - to move from the public service into the private sector and doing jobs for which they will be sought because of the expertise and experience they have, perhaps as the head of a Department, and the esteem in which they are held. Some former politicians go back to the Law Library or into journalism. As people will be sought after, we need to make the distinction between the two and address the problem we want to address, which is the risk of conflict of interest rather than a generalised restriction on people which would be impossible to implement and probably wrong in principle to try to do.

I believe it was Senator Ross who made the point that a significant onus needs to be placed on the individual. This takes me back to where I started and what Senator Ó Brolcháin said. We need to rely on the quality of the people we have in our public service and the high expectation we have of them and indeed of politicians to carry out their public duties properly and to understand that if they have had that trust reposed in them for seven years, 14 years or whatever it is, that trust does not suddenly stop on the day they walk out of the Department. There is a residual duty related to the fact that they have been in important public positions. They cannot abuse that information or in any way leave themselves open to the allegation that they are using it in a conflicted way.

I am nitpicking, but my point is relevant. I am interested in who makes decisions about whether there is deemed to be a conflict of interest. The motion states an offer of appointment from an employer cannot be accepted outside the Civil Service where it is deemed to create a conflict of interest. It does not state who deems it to be such but continues in paragraph (b) to state the person concerned "cannot accept an engagement in a particular consultancy project, where the nature and terms of such appointment or engagement could lead to a conflict of interest; without first obtaining approval from the Outside Appointments Board". In the motion the requirement to obtain approval seems to cover both paragraphs, (a) and (b), whereas in the text of the new programme for Government the outside appointments board seems to be involved only in the second case and the text appears to be silent on who decides on whether there is deemed to be a conflict of interest. Perhaps it is only a drafting or merely a minor point, but it has been changed in the motion which is better than the way in which it appears in the programme for Government.