Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I know. I believe I sat in front of the Minister in the last Seanad. It is good he has this role because he has an understanding of this House, what it can do and what it could do, if it was given teeth. It is good that this is now in his remit and I believe history will be kind to him if he grabs hold of it. Let us face it, the Government has been less than decent in how it has perceived and handled the Seanad. The Minister now has a leadership role in that regard. I also take the opportunity to congratulate my former colleague, Deirdre Clune, on winning a seat in the European Parliament, thus vacating her seat in the Seanad.

I wish to make three points. Undoubtedly, other Senators have asked this question, but why has the post of Clerk of the Dáil not been filled? As Senator John Crown said, the post was vacated one year ago, but it had been flagged for months in advance. We knew the vacancy would arise. We have read the speculation that the Ceann Comhairle, Deputy Sean Barrett, had a disagreement with the Taoiseach, that there was jockeying for the position and about who should get it. Fundamentally, until we get rid patronage and favouritism and bat for professionalism and competence, we will not be in touch with what the people want. This cute hoorism must leave politics. We all know that it is happening every minute of every day. We need only look at how the positions were allocated in the reshuffle. I spoke this morning about the three Gs - how geography lost out in terms of those from Galway and the west; how the Gaeltacht and Gaeilge lost out and how gender lost out in terms of women losing out. However, that is not the reason I am contributing to this debate. I have asked my first question as to why the post has not been filled and when we will start to bat for professionalism and competence.

In conversation with a person outside the House last night I said one of the things that made me have a great deal of confidence in Ireland was the hearings we held last year when we invited professionals to appear before Members. They were psychiatrists, doctors and legal professionals. When one leaves the professional world and comes into this one, one is in danger of forgetting the professional standards in society. While the post in question remains unfilled, the same is happening here. We are saying there are no competent professionals among the public, which is not true. I agree with Senator John Crown. The Government is blocking the Bill, not the Members of the House who vote against it, although I do not doubt that it will be passed.

The second point that must be made concerns the importance of listening to what the people said in the referendum. They said they wanted this House to be retained and reformed. They want it to have adequate teeth to hold the Executive to account. That means, at least, a vote for every person. The Minister's big challenge is to ensure there is universal suffrage, not just university suffrage which, while it would benefit me and others, would still leave 75% of the population outside the loop. It also still leaves the House at risk of being called elitist, something I abhor. Unless we heed the result of the referendum, we are answering in the negative the question, "Do people and democracy matter?"

A new job has come into existence that is becoming very important to companies. It is about analytics in the social media world. People are being hired to see what is being said about companies. Big companies such as Vodafone, Meteor and others are investing in people to engage in analytics to get to the back story of what the public thinks about them. We have been told by the public what it thinks of this House and that it wants to retain it. Can we, please, just pay the public a little respect and enact legislation?

I support what Senator Paul Bradford said. When the candidate is nominated by the Government parties - I do not doubt that it will be a Fine Gael candidate - I hope it will be a woman, given that a woman vacated the seat and in view of the poor gender allocation we saw this week. Second, above all, let it be someone who is not hypocritical and wished to abolish the House. It really is outrageous that Senators on the other side of the House openly campaigned to abolish the House but still remain in it and take a salary. That is the utmost hypocrisy. I wish the Minister the best of luck.