Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Following up on the point Senator Daly raised, there is good deal of merit in having a Minister of State with responsibility for the Irish overseas. I support the call for a debate not only on the Irish overseas but more specifically on the undocumented Irish in the United States and on what is happening in that respect. There are many positive developments but we have seen many false dawns. I would like the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade to come into the House in early September to update the House on what is being done at Government level and formally and informally to assist our friends on Capitol Hill who are trying to get legislation over the line that will help the 50,000 of our citizens who are undocumented in the United States.

I also support the call by Senator MacSharry for a pre-budget debate. To be fair to the Leader, this House has been very active in having pre-budget debates in the past few years. As I have said previously, I would very much subscribe to a process whereby the Budget Statement would be a summing up of our full deliberations that would take place in Parliament in the months prior to the budget. Under the current process the budget is effectively the opening shot. If Parliament is to be properly reformed and to mean something radical, we would have a completely changed structure where all the various committees and interests, whether it be in the area of education, tourism, arts, culture, housing or the environment, would debate the worthwhile budget submissions we receive, recommendations would be made to the Minister on areas where effective cost savings and spending programmes would be initiated and the Minister would sum up that and that would be the end of the process, as opposed to the beginning of it. I appreciate that would constitute radical reform and it may not happen in the lifetime of this Government but we should debate it.