Brian Ó Domhnaill (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Dr. Maurice Manning and the members of the team for coming to the House this afternoon. They have done a very important piece of work.

The real debate about politics in this country and right across Europe is about the hollowing out of the state. Various academic arguments have been presented both in this country, England and right across Europe on the hollowing out. What does that mean?To determine what it means in Ireland, one must consider the reforms in the way in which new public management has been introduced, the hollowing out of the powers of the Oireachtas through the centralisation of decision-making by the Cabinet, as outlined by Senator Sean D. Barrett, and the Europeanisation effect, which means the European Union is being given more power, while the Dáil and the Seanad are becoming irrelevant. Ultimately, the real debate is about where political power lies and who the power brokers are. This is a very important matter as the approach is to attack the weakest power broker. We need to examine this issue in a broader sense. We need to examine the issues of political reform in all of its senses, public sector reform and where and in whose interests decisions are being taken.

Notwithstanding the importance of what is before us, there are bigger fish to fry. In saying this and having read the documentation, there is a need to reform and modernise this House. It is a question of how we go about doing this. I agree with some of the proposals made in this regard, while I disagree with others. The role of the Seanad needs to be strengthened, but I caution on two aspects, the first of which concerns diminishing the role of councillors. I once was of the view that there should be widespread elections to fill all seats in this House, but I have since concluded that that would be wrong because there would be a double election, with the same people electing different people to two Houses, which might not result in the required diversity of opinion. Under the new local government reforms, each councillor represents 4,800 electors, not 2,000.

With regard to the diaspora, we have to be careful. Let us examine the French Senate model in this regard. Some 95% of all French Senators are elected by councillors, while two or three are elected by the diaspora. Perhaps that is a system we should consider.