Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

-----and to accept for itself the autonomy of deciding who should and should not be its Chairman and Vice Chairman in future. We are blessed on this occasion that all the candidates proposed, and the candidate I am proposing, are suitable people to be appointed Vice Chairman of this House as the Cathaoirleach was to be appointed Chairman. All are people worthy of the position, I have no doubt. The only way to ensure that in future this House takes its autonomy seriously and elects the person it really wants to have in a position, rather than engaging in horse-trading among various outside interests or the interests of the Government or the Opposition - because the new politics may not always prevail - is to make the changes to the Standing Orders of this House that were made to the Standing Orders of Dáil Éireann, to provide for a system of election by secret ballot on a proportional representation basis. That was done in Dáil Éireann as a result of a campaign. I played a minor part in that campaign, speaking in Glenties in Donegal about the necessity of it. A campaign was carried out to ensure that the last Dáil was not dissolved without making the position of Cathaoirleach autonomous and elected by the Members without reference to party whips, diktats from the Government or deals between parties, but on the basis that each individual Member, voting with his or her conscience, experience and judgment, voted for the candidate he or she thought best. This House should follow the precedent the other House has set to give itself the scope of private judgment to decide these matters rather than to read about them in the newspapers. I read a fortnight ago what was likely to happen today and that people were putting together deals on positions in the other House. This does not apply to Senator Coghlan but I read in one newspaper article that a particular outcome had been bartered between two groups, depending on support in one House for one outcome and for another outcome in this House. That is not right.

Turning to the merits of my candidate, Senator Craughwell is a former president of the Teachers' Union of Ireland, TUI. He has immense experience chairing individual institutions. He has chaired conferences. He has chaired the national executive committee of the TUI and joint meetings between the TUI, the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland, the Irish National Teachers Organisation and the Irish Federation of University Teachers. He has chaired further education and training committees and the organisation and training committee of the TUI.

Senator Craughwell came into this House by the Independent route. He has no party political baggage behind him. He would discharge his function in a totally independent and non-partisan way. Therefore, it gives me great pleasure to nominate him. In nominating Senator Craughwell, Senator Boyhan and I want to make it clear that the group to which we belong, the Seanad Independent group, is not allied to any other political party and is not part of some informal coalition. We will exercise our independent judgment on all issues, and in that spirit and for that reason, I commend the election of Senator Gerard Craughwell as Leas-Chathaoirleach of this House.