Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Thank you very much. That would be seen for what it was. The Senator wants her little pot of money and to walk away with it.

I also want to say that what I said on the first occasion has been misrepresented again by Senator Bradford. What I suggested in terms of resigning was that if a Member wanted his or her own allowance, there was a way to do that. I was elected to the other House under the banner of the Labour Party with the resources of that party behind me, the discernment of my selection convention who wanted a Labour Party candidate to stand and for whom to canvass, and the unpaid work of scores of party members to elect me to the House. It would be quite wrong for me to be able to say that I can make a discernment and nullify all that work and not give them the chance to put somebody in my stead if I had a conscientious objection. If I felt that I could not in conscience remain, the right thing to do would be to resign, and then to get a fresh mandate from the people as an Independent. One could then, rightly and morally, take one's pool of money at that stage, but it is quite a different kettle of fish to do so in the context that was put forward here.

I have been around this course three times and have heard the same arguments three times. I do not think we are going to have a meeting of minds on it because I understand that at the heart of this is a debate that is not about this Bill. I am very conscious of that. When people lecture me about reform, democracy and everything else when the point at issue amounts to simply taking money away from the political party of which they are no longer a member, I have to think about that. The essence of the Bill before us comprises two main planks. I am a little concerned that we are spending endless hours on the ancillary rather than the core of the Bill. The two core elements of it are, first, to reduce the allowance to all political parties by 10% as a contribution towards reducing the overall costs and, second, to bring accountability, extending it from the parties which are, and always were, required to have audited, accounted and transparent accountability for the money they receive and to transfer that to all Independent Members. Independent Members who are elected as Independent Members are entitled to a parliamentary allowance that is analogous to the sums given to the parties. They now will be required in the normal way, in the same way as parties, to account for that.