Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the comments made by Senator Dolan. I wish to say that I disagree with hit-and-run heckling. I refer to the idea of a Member getting up and making a loud noise to disrupt a speaker without even giving that person the courtesy of a full hearing as he or she walks out of the Chamber. I do not think that is any way to behave.

Today, I call on the Minister for Health to honour a commitment to tender openly for an independent chairperson for the three-year review of the 2018 abortion legislation. I also call on the Minister to account for a Department of Health press release, dated 8 December 2021, which falsely claimed to have published an open tender for the independent chairperson. The press release states:

.... a request for tenders to carry out research into the views of service providers has also been published on the eTenders website today, 8 December 2021.

That statement is false because the only request for a tender that was published by the Department was for a person or organisation to carry out research. There was no reference to a chair.

On 8 December, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health had a meeting that was attended by the Minister for Health and his officials. At that meeting it was made clear that the appointment of a chairperson must legally go to published tender as the costs could be up to €100,000. In a reply given yesterday to a parliamentary question tabled by Deputy Michael Collins, the Minister confirmed:

.... a small number of candidates, identified as having suitable experience .... were contacted and invited to apply for the role of independent Chair.

I think that the Minister must now account to the Oireachtas for the discrepancy between his statements and actions. We need to know whether, at the time of claiming that a request for tender had taken place, the Minister knew that that had not happened, and that it was not going to happen.

Last Thursday, the Minister told The Irish Timesthat he had to go through a process for the appointment of a chair. He did not disclose that it is now a secret closed process instead of the open one that he said had been launched. He needs to explain why he misled people. He must explain the lack of transparency in his approach. It raises the question of whether the person being picked will be really independent. Many voices, perhaps including that of the Leader, have stressed the need for that. I worry now that this is about getting somebody who suits the preferred views of the Minister and his Department. We heard criticism of the closed approach by the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, to his climate council picks, and the accusation of cronyism was levelled. I believe that ideological cronyism is just as bad. I ask the Leader for her support. Regardless of people's views, a commitment was given that there would be an open tender process for a chair. That has not happened. They have done something different and they have not even told us.