Denis Landy (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. I am pleased that this Bill is being given adequate time to be debated in this House. I have listened with interest to the speeches already made on the issue and would like to make a number of points in response. First, I wish to address the speech delivered yesterday by the Taoiseach, which was respectfully, if not warmly, received by Members of this House. The Taoiseach spoke about the need for Government to reform politics and made reference to the fact that nothing was done for 75 years on reforming the Seanad, almost as if that was the fault of the current Seanad. He also referred to the fact that initially vocational panels were set up to ensure that we had expertise in this House and he intimated that this had not worked out very well. However, it is only fair to say, as was pointed out yesterday, that we do have expertise in this House, from Senators Barrett, Quinn and many others, across a wide range of fields in this country.

The Taoiseach also made reference to the fact that several other EU countries have unicameral systems, including Denmark, Finland, Norway, Croatia and Slovakia. However, he failed to deal with the system of government below the national parliaments in those countries. Finland, for example, has 304 local authorities and 10,000 local councillors. Norway has 423 local authorities and 12,000 councillors. This is in stark contrast to what is being proposed in this country under the guise of local government reform, with the number of councillors decreasing from 1,467 to 949 and with the rural parts of Ireland being hardest hit. In Monaghan, for example, the number of councillors will fall from 56 to 18, a decrease of 68%. In Tipperary, the number will fall from 100 to 40, a drop of 60% and in the Taoiseach's own county of Mayo, the number of councillors will drop from 52 to 30, a decrease of 42%. We must compare this to the numbers involved in local government across Europe. In Denmark, there is one local councillor for every 2,245 people while in Norway, there is one for every 423 people. One might ask what is the relevance of this in the context of the debate today. It is relevant because not alone do we intend to strip out the Second House of democracy, we also intend to strip out major tiers of local government. Indeed, the system of local government in this country is as centralised, if not more so, than the British system, from which it devolved. When one looks at regional governance across Europe, one sees that finance is raised locally and service provision is locally based but in this country there are no services at local level worth talking about and there is no intention, as yet, to put any new decentralised services into the local government reform Bill. In that context, it is very difficult to accept the comparisons that the Taoiseach made yesterday when he spoke of Scandinavian countries and the fact they did not have a second house of parliament and questioned why we should have one. The answer to that question is very clear - those countries have real, working regional government but we have none.

The other issue that the Taoiseach chose not to address in his speech yesterday is that of cost savings. The initial statements from the Government regarding to the abolition of the Seanad suggested that its removal would save the State up to €20 million per annum. The actual figure for the salaries of Senators is €4.2 million per annum. It has now been discovered by the pro-abolitionists that the issue of cost savings should be dropped from their agenda. My own party colleague, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, has said on more than one occasion that no money will be saved by the abolition of the Seanad because the money will be redeployed to Dáil committees. Indeed, Deputy Twomey requested that any money that is saved be redeployed to Dáil committees. The argument on cost savings has now been nullified by the Government itself.

In that context, one must ask why we are proceeding with this. Are we proceeding because a commitment was made at a press conference in October of 2009 or are we proceeding because, as some Senators have suggested, this House is not working properly and is not actually doing the job it was set up to do? No more than many other new Senators in this House, I can only judge from what I have seen in the past two and a half years. Within the limited scope of what this House is allowed to do constitutionally, I believe it is doing a very good job. However, if we want to reform the work of the Seanad, why did we choose to take the road we are on, namely, either abolition or retention? I was asked on local radio recently whether I believed there was an option B. There was apparently no option B to Croke Park II, but when it was rejected, we discovered that there was the Haddington Road agreement. There is always an option B and in this case, that should mean reform. Reform of this House should include an examination of the Whip system that is currently in place. Senators should also be given the opportunity to vote on legislation as they see fit, in accordance with certain criteria.

People say we are removed from the public and democracy and do not represent people. Some 43 Members of the House are directly elected by councillors in county and city councils. On average, each councillor who was elected got 1,500 votes. The number of votes received by successful Senators in the House, on average, is 75. If one does the maths, we represent, albeit once removed, 100,000 people on average. To say we do not represent the public is untrue.

I refer to the role of Senators outside of legislation in representing councillors who are their electorate. I, like most other Senators, receive representations daily from councillors of all parties and none on issues of relevance to them at local and national level. We use our position as Members of the House to raise those issues on the Order of Business or to bring forward the views expressed to us by councillors when legislation is being debated by the House. That is a representative role which is undervalued and unknown by many people in this country.

Most of us do not think up issues to raise on the Order of Business for the good of our health. For example, yesterday I raised the issue of unscrupulous moneylenders in this country and the fact that even those who are licensed are operating outside the law. I did not decide to raise that yesterday. I was contacted by a number of councillors who have faced this issue in their communities. As a Member of the House I took the opportunity to request that the matter be addressed by the Central Bank which is the licensing agency for moneylenders.

We in this House carry out a very important role. We should not run hastily to abolish it. The Minister of State, who was a Member of the House and was also a local authority member for a number of years, knows full well what I am talking about. It was said that the House has not referred legislation back during its two and a half years in existence. I still wonder what the right thing to do is in regard to this Bill. Maybe the debate does need an extra 90 days and perhaps I will reflect on that after the debate today before I press any bell.