Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I note Muiris MacCárthaigh's article in yesterday's edition of the Irish Independent, entitled "Executive accountability in the Dáil still elephant in the room". I quoted the article from The Irish Times and I met its author.

He gave the name of the Minister who, during a break said, Ministers decide, the Civil Service then takes over and if anybody in the Dáil puts his head above the parapet it is not going to happen. I shall tell the Senator the name in private conversation. I did not ask Stephen Collins who it was but he volunteered the name. That Minister is obviously concerned.

I come from a long line, dating back to 1607, of TCD representation in College Green, in Westminster and here. We have never let the side down. I will be sorry to see our constituency abolished if this is passed. The people whom I admire most from the past are David Plunkett and John Ball, the two TCD MPs in Westminster who, on 12 March 1873, voted against Gladstone's Irish Universities Bill which would have absorbed Queen's University into Trinity, run down Cork and closed Galway as uneconomic. Those two voted out Gladstone's government and voted Disraeli in. They had the courage of their convictions. We have always been like that, right up to the modern era, for example, Skeffington arguing against the ill-treatment of children when that was the norm, Mary Robinson favouring human rights long before that was the norm and Trevor West's stand on anti-sectarianism North and South. That is a proud record and I will defend it. I agree with the speaker - I think it was Senator Quinn - who said that if we ever do discuss reform, we cannot really expect to end up with a Seanad that is the same as the Dáil. That is not the purpose of the Seanad. This is a review Chamber, for putting forward views which are not otherwise represented.

I thank everybody who spoke on this amendment and I am proud to respond to their comments. I feel somewhat strange in this role. There were 77 amendments with something like 180 signatures-----