Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate there is a difference between canvassing and the process whereby the leader of a small party in coalition would receive three names from the Minister for Justice and say "I do not know these three people from Adam and I do not know between them, which of them is the best, because the Bill says there is no order". If I was the leader of a party in the Government I would certainly want to take soundings before walking into Cabinet to be told they are all on a list and they are all of equal standing, all equally eligible for appointment. I would like to know whether a person is liberal or conservative or whatever. In order to do that, even if there were three people there, I would ask somebody I trusted for advice, such as a member of my own party perhaps who was a lawyer if I was not one myself, on which of those three is the best, in his or her view, rather than going to Cabinet and just sitting there in a state of ignorance.It is important that we take on board that a consequence of this Bill being drafted in this way is that while it is a criminal offence for the applicant for a position to engage in canvassing, curiously, the wife or husband of the applicant can do it like billy-o. Paragraph (d) states “procure or counsel another person ... to engage in the conduct” but an ambitious spouse or ambitious friend can canvass furiously. The only person who is prohibited from doing it is the applicant himself or herself.

This has not been thought through. If I inform a politically influential friend that I believe I am shortlisted, and that person on my behalf decides to tap the shoulder of Cabinet members and say “That person would make a good judge”, in those circumstances, is an offence committed? An applicant would be disqualified under subsection (2) but a friend of the applicant who knew that he or she was shortlisted would not be disqualified and no offence would be committed unless it was done at the behest of the applicant. I wonder what we are attempting to achieve here. I believe the absence of a guarantee of secrecy from the whole process is going to deter a lot of people from making applications. If you read on the front of a newspaper that the political correspondent of the Daily Buglehas ascertained that you were turned down by the Cabinet three times in a row, what are you to make of that, what are you to do about it and what right of complaint have you got about it? None.