David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I was a trifle surprised that there was no media coverage whatsoever of the debate on the Legal Services Regulation Bill last night. I think they missed the real story. We spent six hours here dealing with 25 pages of amendments. We went from six o'clock until midnight. I commend the Leader of the House, Senator Maurice Cummins, because he stood up for parliamentary discipline. Despite the intentions and wishes of the Minister, which were made very clear indeed, either to guillotine it or continue on until four or five in the morning, Senator Cummins remanded the Seanad at midnight, and quite right too. Well done to the Leader. We had 23 pages of amendments to one page of the Bill. We had amendments to amendments that were made last week. It was bizarre. I have never, in my entire time in the House - nearly 30 years - seen anything remotely comparable.

I suggested that because of this concentration of amendments on page 41, the logical thing would have been to reprint page 41 in full. I also suggested that we should reprint the Bill with the Committee Stage amendments. The Bill had already been amended, but we were not given an amended Bill to work off. We were therefore working off five documents at the same time, including lists of grouped amendments, Committee Stage amendments, Report Stage amendments and the Bill itself. It was an absolute nightmare and there was great dissatisfaction on all sides of the House.

Serious issues were raised. I raised the question of the total absence of a definition of "monitor", which was a significant area. The Bill defines what a CEO is. Everybody knows what a CEO is, but nobody defined the responsibilities, duties and functions of the monitor. It was just left there as a new word.

I would like to second both Senator O'Donovan's amendment that this Bill be withdrawn and Senator Barrett's amendment that we take item No. 16 first.