John Crown (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Cullinane for sharing time. This afternoon's proceedings, including the Government's amendment to the substantive motion, constitute a powerful argument in favour of emigration.

This country desperately needs political reform. The disaster we faced over the last five years was not primarily due to bankers, builders or bureaucrats. Bankers and builders acted understandably, albeit in a self-defeating manner, in what they perceived to be their self-interest in a wild and unregulated environment because the Government had failed to act on behalf of the people by reining in the self-interest of those who were always going to build houses that were not needed if they could get money for doing so or offer loans that could not be repaid if they were going to get short-term bonuses for doing so. The people who failed the country were the elected politicians.

I hold my dear Leader - not in the North Korean sense - in high esteem and I understand why he proposes amendments which I suspect he does not fully support in his heart and soul. However, which of the reforms set out in the amendment would have prevented our catastrophe? Reducing the number of Deputies from 166 to 158 gives us an even shallower talent pool from which to pick Ministers. The reform of local government has had the effect of diminishing local government. In a country with one of the lowest proportions of elected representatives per head of population in the world, we are increasing the ratio even further. Instead of improving access to freedom of information, we are increasing the cost and making it more cumbersome. Having sat through the pre-legislative deliberations on the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill, I would argue that most of what we did was optics. I hate to say this, but when we consider the alleged reforms to the Oireachtas committee system I begin to think we are expected to pretend black is white. Committees are more politicised than ever and they have been systematically stripped of the people who might have brought non-partisan, dispassionate and technical expertise because they were politically inconvenient.

Under our system of elections, we elect people to Dáil constituencies primarily on the basis of local interests. The bitterest rivals for these local politicians are not those at the opposite end of the political spectrum but other candidates from their own parties who are looking for the same pool of core votes. Deputies are silenced and whipped into submission. We could in truth replace many of our elections with sheepdog trials because we elect people who will never introduce a novel idea or challenge their parties' orthodoxies. These individuals are simply channelled submissively into their voting lobbies through fear-----