Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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Question 45: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government the reason he has rowed back on his promise to introduce a complete ban on corporate donations; and his commitment to take the necessary legal and constitutional steps in this regard. [15597/11]

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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On 8 June 2011, I published the General Scheme of the Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding) Bill 2011. In line with the Government's commitment significantly to reform political funding in Ireland, this Bill will implement commitments in the Programme for Government and recommendations made in the Moriarty Tribunal Report Into Payments to Politicians and Related Matters.

The Bill provides, inter alia, for a ban on the acceptance of donations over €200 from all sources, other than from individuals, by political parties and their accounting units, candidates, Oireachtas Members, Members of the European Parliament, local authority members and third parties, as defined in the Electoral Acts, unless the body has registered with the Standards in Public Office Commission and has furnished, in writing -

· the name and address of the person or persons responsible for the organisation, management or financial affairs of the body;

· a statement of the nature and purpose of the body;

· a list of the membership or shareholders of the body;

· a copy of its statement of accounts for that year, and;

· a copy of the annual report to its members;

and,

the donor has declared to the recipient that the donation has been authorised by a general meeting of the members of the body concerned.

Fianna Fáil, in introducing its Electoral (Amendment) (Political Donations) Bill 2011 in Private Members time in the Dáil on 10 May 2011, acknowledged legal advice it had received to the effect that an outright ban on corporate donations would be likely to be unconstitutional. The Government's approach also recognises this position and therefore provides for significant restrictions on corporate donations. This approach will achieve the objective of addressing the widespread concern that the large-scale corporate funding of politics is unhealthy for democracy. The General Scheme that I recently published also contains a number of other wide ranging and radical measures to reform political funding arrangements.