Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Will the Leader consider asking either the Taoiseach or Tánaiste, whichever feels so inclined, to come before us and explain how it is that the Minister, Deputy Shane Ross, who has just been mentioned in a different context, is permitted to write articles in newspapers so charged with inaccuracy and misleading content, as he has done this morning in today's edition of The Irish Times? He has yet again suggested that somehow, the Judiciary is against reform. That flies in the face of the fact that the current Chief Justice authored the Bill which provided for a judicial council to be established. It also flies in the face of the fact that members of the Judiciary have on many occasions asked for reforms to the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board and that has not been granted to it. It is serious because the Minister, Deputy Ross, is the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. With the buses about to evaporate across Ireland and with train lines being closed down, not to mention some of the sporting debacles in Brazil, it seems the Minister is finding it very difficult to discharge his own functions. It also appears he cannot even make appointments in his own Department to semi-State boards but the one thing he is apparently absolutely concerned with is the making of judicial appointments. The House should know, because eventually some legislation will come before us, that in 2013 he proposed that the committees of the Houses of the Oireachtas should make nominations for people to be judges. He said that would stop cronyism. How ignorant and crass is that as a suggestion?