Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senators for their views on these amendments. It is a pity that the occurrence of "or is likely to be" is widespread in legislation. We are facing a problem when so much public administration has failed. It gives a defence against answering questions and a considerable amount is wrong. While I do not have a background in the health service, in the area of economics, during the period we got into trouble, where on earth were highly paid people in the Central Bank, the Department of Finance, and the accountancy and other regulatory bodies who were supposed to be regulating banks? The Government is introducing whistleblower legislation, but we must assist them so that bodies that have failed cannot use opt-out clauses to stop discussing policy. We have spent four years trying to find out what on earth the aforementioned bodies were doing in the damage they did for the economy, which also has implications for the health service. I would hope we would move towards more answering of questions and less closed public administration. The current system is not serving the country.

It could be said that the public face of Government was easily solved because we had an election, following which one of the Government parties, which had been in power for the best part of 80 years, was reduced from 78 to 20 seats.

There is concern that the permanent Government remains, is largely exempt from the consequences of failed advice and bad policies, continues to opt-out on the basis of freedom of information defences, does not write anything down lest a journalist might discover it and so on. We need a new culture of administration and not only in the area of health.

I accept what the Minister said. However, our public administration has failed people. The political element of failure has been dealt with by the public. We now need to reform the way in which we do our public business. I will withdraw the amendment based on what the Minister had to say. However, I believe we have a wider cultural problem in Irish public service, to which I have tried to draw attention in my amendments.