Jerry Buttimer (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Senator Horkan raised the issue of gift vouchers, which is very timely. My information is the drafting of the legislation is proving to be more difficult than was originally envisaged. It is the intention of the Minister to have the legislation published and to then come before the Houses of the Oireachtas early next year but there are issues in the drafting. People also need to read the small print on gift vouchers. I hope those who give gift vouchers recognise some of them have an expiry date. I hope goodwill is shown by the store or service provider.

Senator Horkan raised the issue of climate change and it was addressed yesterday. This morning, the Minister, Deputy Bruton, appeared on Seán O'Rourke's radio programme and he is attending a conference today in Oslo. We are behind in our targets and we have a lot of work to do. The all-party committee of the Houses of the Oireachtas on climate change will conclude its work at the end of January and the Minister is committed to an action plan to tackle a suite of issues on climate change and I hope we will do this.

Senators Horkan and McDowell raised the issue of the Downing Street Declaration and commended all involved in the commemoration events this week. As I said to the people in the Gallery who have now left, we are benefitting from the prosperity of a peace dividend that is, to be fair, a credit to Albert Reynolds and John Major and all involved in Irish politics who work so hard to ensure we have peace on our island.

Senators McDowell and Norris touched upon the issue of Seanad reform. Not wanting to pre-empt or leak any part of the agreed report that is not yet finalised, because Members will be asked for submissions, I commend Senator McDowell on his resilience, patience, extraordinary courtesy and tunnel vision in having his way - sorry, in providing the final document yesterday afternoon. All jokes aside, to be fair to Senator McDowell, as chairman of the committee he certainly galvanised minds. I thank Dr. Brian Hunt, Síle de Búrca and members of the Department of the Taoiseach for their fantastic work. I also thank those who appeared before the committee. Irrespective of one's viewpoint on the final outcome, the process was a good one in that we were able in a non-adversarial way to have a healthy debate on Seanad reform and the future of the Seanad. We have had 12 or 13 reports to date on Seanad reform and we will have that debate in due course again. There will be ample opportunities for Senator Norris's views to be articulated and heard I am sure he will be able to impress upon people the need to resist change or go with it, whichever the case may be.