Caít Keane (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fíorfháilte roimh an Dochtúir Maurice Manning agus an Uasal Joe O'Toole. Míle buíochas as ucht an obair dhian atá déanta acu dúinn inniu agus le bliain anuas. I welcome the debate, which is very important. As the Leader said, not everybody can be on a forum or working group and it is important to get the view of all Members. It is the only chance we may get, as not all of us will be on the group. Today's debate is about providing us with a chance. It is not a talking shop or just for the fun of it. It is to find out everybody's views because no one person has the say on what will happen.

Back in 2009 Fine Gael proposed that every citizen would have a vote in the Seanad. That predates my election to the Seanad in 2011. Nobody has a franchise on reforming the Seanad. We have many reports but we must have action. The Taoiseach has said there will be action and the Leader has repeated that again today. It is important that the group would be set up immediately and that it would start the process of change now.

I welcome the report. I accept it was not possible to provide a costing in the time available to the working group. Every time a budget is put forward by a party in the House, we criticise it if it is not costed. We must look for value for money. We require change but it must be right for the citizen. That is also the case with our own papers and policy documents. When the argument for Seanad reform was put forward in the Seanad university constituencies the Government introduced change. That happened since the Government took office in 2011. I welcome that change, which was acknowledged in the report.

Another recommendation from 2009 related to procedural reform.Senator Cummins has done some work on that. There is a lot more to do, which is why I want to ensure that the Seanad gets extra duties. We have already succeeded in respect of the reform of the universities and Senator Bacik has outlined something that was recommended in the report. It relates to how university graduates could choose to run on another panel. I cannot figure out how that will work. I will not dwell on it because Senator Bacik has spoken about how it is going to work. That change was on the cards for 17 years. The Government has done it and it should be acknowledged. I thank the working group for acknowledging it in the report.

We are setting up a electoral commission. I am a member of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on the Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht, which is discussing that matter at the moment. Many of the issues that will be on the agenda in respect of Seanad reform are coming up in the committee. Examples include the registration of voters and who will be responsible for it. The electoral commission is an important part of this debate. It was recommended in the report that the interim group that would be set up would be subsumed into the electoral commission. This is putting the cart before the horse because the committee that is looking at the electoral commission will be making recommendations on how the commission should be formed. Both groups must work together because one group could recommend one thing, the other could recommend another, we would fall down in the middle and nobody would do anything. This is what we must guard against.

Part 6 of the report deals with implementation and recommends that the membership of the interim implementation body should have access to IT experts. I agree with this. As Senator Cummins said, the Seanad must have secretarial back-up because if it does not, how can Members are scrutinise EU legislation with their hands tied behind their backs? This must be taken into consideration when it comes to cost. The report recommended that the interim body have access to political scientists and experts with knowledge and practical experience of national politics and that eventually the interim body and its functions would be subsumed into the wider electoral commission. I have a question about that.

I thank the reform group for the work it has put in and those who provided their time, all of whom worked on a pro bonobasis.They include Brian Hunt from Microsoft and Deirdre Lane who provided advice on the deconstruction of the complicated nominating process. It is quite a process to deconstruct because I have tried explaining it to a few people. Another individual who was involved is Michael McDowell who provided legal counsel.

One statement I noted in particular is the statement on popular legitimacy.I agree that a reformed Seanad must be seen by Irish citizens as having a legitimate voice and role in the political process. We would be doing ourselves a disservice, and I do not think the report meant this, because when I look around me in here I see quite a few people who have earned their legitimate voice. They were put here by people who were elected by the legitimate voice of the people, namely, councillors who are in touch with the people on the ground. Councillors have a legitimate voice so I would not dismiss their value and I do not think the report intended to do this by suggesting that it would be more legitimate if people were elected some other way. The legitimacy of elected and nominated personnel of this House has much to offer. The Seanad has offered much since the foundation of the State and as Senator Darragh O'Brien, who has served in both Houses, noted, there is no better House in terms of scrutinising legislation. As the old saying goes, "If you respect yourself, you're given respect". The people had respect and, hopefully, still have respect for the Seanad because they voted to retain it. This says a lot.

Senator Cummins has changed and enlarged the duties of the Seanad in respect of scrutinising EU legislation. He has invited different representatives from community organisations, taken their recommendations on board and implemented them through legislation. We all agree that the Seanad will be reformed within the legislative process and not through altering the Constitution.

Another recommendation was that the Seanad should have a distinct composition. It is related to the various methodologies of panels. I looked up the definition of "distinct" because I was unsure what is meant by the term "distinct composition". When I look around the House, I see distinguished Members who differ in philosophy and personality. A system that excludes the majority of its citizens from participation does lack popular legitimacy. Including every third-level institution in the voting process will go some way towards addressing that. We must go further but it is far harder to do it than to say it must be done.

Section 35 of the Bill recommended that the Northern Ireland division of the Electoral Commission of the United Kingdom would be involved in verifying eligibility to register by applicants based in Northern Ireland.The Taoiseach pointed out here that legislation made in this State could not compel or direct a body in another state to perform a particular function. We need verifiable data analysis if we are to have electronic voting because every country that has electronic voting has a system of verifiable electronic data identification. It could be through PPS numbers, passports or another methodology.

In respect of the recommendation on gender balance, I was never in favour of gender quotas until I saw that they actually work. However, it only relates to a recommendation rather than actual voting so that measure is problematic as well. In case everybody thinks Ireland is the odd country out and that the Seanad is only elected by the few, Canada's Upper House is un-elected. All Members are appointed. The German Upper House is formed indirectly of Members appointed or elected by the regional governments. All the Members of the French Upper House are elected indirectly by the elected members of the 100 French Departments.

Some very distinguished Members of this House have come from Northern Ireland. In respect of citizens living abroad, #hometovotewas a great initiative but #stayawayandvoteis a different matter. I do not have all the figures but according to the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, 230,000 Irish citizens are living in Australia. The figures are skewed. The globalirish.comwebsite gives totally different figures. How many of the 3 million holders of Irish passports are Irish citizens? Could we have more people voting abroad than at home?