David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

An example is the blasphemy business, which was complete nonsense. I remember saying, when the Bill on blasphemy was debated in the House, that within a matter of weeks some of the Muslim countries would point to Ireland as an example. Within a month Pakistan did so, but both Houses pushed the legislation through on the instruction of the Government. That is another example of why we should not have democratic institutions micro-managed by the Government.

Mr. Arnold, in a very good and wide-ranging report and speech, said that the convention examined various matters, including the reports prepared by the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution, which produced 11 reports from 1997 to 2006. I did my best to open up the convention to things such as Seanad reform, but that was prevented. Before the convention got wise to my ways, however, I managed to raise the question of the Presidency - in a real way, not fluting around on the margins, which is basically what we did. Nobody gives much of a damn about the term of office of the President. However, I raised the matter at the convention because the chairman kindly allowed me to do so and gave latitude for it. There was a discussion on it. As many as 96% of the people - by far the largest vote ever in the convention - voted in favour of the role being opened up to citizen nomination. Where is that stated in the report and recommendations that will be considered by the Government? The one thing on which there was almost 100% agreement has been omitted. It is not only that. I have in my hand a Bill that was produced by the present Government parties in 1997 in which they suggested, among other things, that 20,000 citizens should be able to nominate. Where is that stated in the report?

With regard to Seanad reform - I know I am going over old ground - we were very timid and the people were intimidated, quite deliberately in my opinion, because it was said from the platform that if we dared to write a letter to the Taoiseach, the whole convention would collapse. That was the amount of pressure that was applied to prevent the discussion of the single most important change in the Constitution, but the people decided, thank God, at the last moment, when it ceased being a vanity competition, although we all managed to get involved in it. We won, and we changed the result from 60:40 in favour of the Government in just ten days. I received correspondence just yesterday asking what had happened to the issue of presidential nominations. We are lucky to have an excellent President who was elected through a situation that should be addressed in other ways.

Well done, and I extend that to the distinguished visitors from the administration, although sometimes they were too close to the Government position. It is an experiment well worth repeating but there should be provision, if we are going to be really democratic, for the citizens to have some role in selecting the items and in setting the agenda. When the brief is determined by a Government with specific aims, it will make damn sure that is all that is considered. The two items, including the question of the Seanad, are a blot. The other blot is that the matter that got the most overwhelming support has been effectively buried, as is the constitutional habit of most Governments. I would like Mr. Arnold to refer to that and see if we can advance it. I intend to reintroduce the Government's Bill and see if we can do it through Parliament. I would have liked it to be taken more seriously through the convention but I congratulate all those involved.

I express particular gratitude that we had such wonderful participation from the people of Ireland. I was cynical about it and thought they would not perform but they performed better than the politicians.