Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

We need to be clear about what is in front of us. It would be misrepresentative to present it either as the reform we need of the Seanad or even as a first step towards that reform. What we have now is not the beginning of a path to reform; rather, it is the latest play in what has been a litany of blocks, delays and obstructions put in the way of Seanad reform by governments for a long time, but in particular by the c current and previous Governments and the two parties that have worked together in them. Being really clear, the plan consistently has been that the Government obstructs, delays and then obstructs again. It is only because it has run out of road, thanks to the case that was taken to the Supreme Court - and, with others, I commend Tomás Heneghan and FLAC on taking that course - and because of that running out of road on obstruction and delay that we now see the latest move, which is to dilute. It is an attempt to put forward the weakest possible proposal, the absolute minimum, that the Government has to put forward because the Supreme Court made it do so. It sends a very poor signal out to the public. It sends a message of a Government kicking and screaming into the tiniest fragment of reform and a minimalist approach that is completely out of step with the spirit and, indeed, the results of every time we have asked the public to vote on the Seanad and on Seanad reform.

When the public were asked and given the opportunity in 1979, they voted for expansion to the extent offered and sent a clear signal for wider expansion. When the public voted to keep the Seanad after an incredibly cynical attempt to abolish it, they voted for reform. The message was absolutely clear. Those of us who went door to door campaigning during that time will tell the Minister, and the articles in the papers and the opinions people had will too, that consistently the message was that those who voted to keep the Seanad voted for the idea that we should - and this was the actual slogan of the campaign - open it, not close it and that we need to broaden the franchise so every citizen has a say. It was very interesting.

Let us think about those two referendums. Many of the people who voted in 1979 and the people who voted in 2013 did not have a vote in Seanad elections. They were voting on an institution in respect of which they were denied a vote and saying they actually see the value of what happens in the Seanad, have an interest in the Seanad and want a say in what happens in the Seanad. At a time when a cynical Government was quite happy to abolish and remove the Seanad - and I know the Minister may not have been part of that, but it was the Government of the time - the public-----