How TDs Subvert the Dail

It starts, sometimes, with It Says In The Papers. That early in the day. A TD is chomping the toast when he hears mention of some story from, say, page three of the Indo. The story might, perhaps, be about how some government department bought a few boxes of Belgian blotting paper. To most people it's a story of little importance, but a certain kind of TD has the imagination and sheer hard neck to work this up into an electoral asset.

The TD arrives in the Dail at 10.30am for the Order of Business. This is the little ritual in which the Taoiseach announces that day's Dail business. The TDs have to be somewhere in Leinster House, just in case there's a big disagreement on the Order of Business and there's a vote called. Most TDs, when they arrive at the Dail, go to their offices and get on with their constituency work. Some go to the Chamber because they really do want to know today's order of business. Some drift in for the crack. There's usually a bit of crack at this time of day.  Our friend makes sure he's there on time. After the prayer and the formal business he pops up out of his seat and demands that the Taoiseach allow time to discuss the purchase of heathen Belgian blotting paper and this disgraceful slur on the Irish blotting paper industry.  The Ceann Comhairle says that the Deputy is out of order. The TD says it is imperative, with due respect, that this issue, bearing in mind the two hundred thousand unemployed, and our young people in particular, should be discussed.  There is no way that the Ceann Comhairle can allow such a discussion at this stage. He must restore order, must get normal business under way. Everyone knows this. The TD is asked to resume his seat. He keeps on shouting. He's then told to resume his seat. By now everyone knows what the TD is up to and others of his ilk are kicking themselves for not having thought of it first. The cute hoor.  You'll be put out of The House, he's eventually told, if you continue this disruption. And he answers that, by God, he's willing to bear that sacrifice if it means he can be of some help to the poor, benighted blotting paper industry and the thousands dependent on it, our young people in particular. At which point he's ordered out. He leaves, mission accomplished.  During all this his party colleagues join in and support him with cries of "Shame!", "Gerrup the yard" and "Blotting paper scandal". His opponents go "nyagh-nyagh", or words to that effect. There is chaos, laughter, shouting. The disruption can last five minutes or twenty. Once started it can continue even when the TD who began it has been ejected.  Within an hour or so the news of the TD's suspension will be in the newsrooms. It will certainly get onto the TV and radio news, perhaps just a mention, perhaps a bit more - and it will get into the evening papers. If it's a slow news day it may be blown up and stuck on the front page. "Buster Birdbrain TD ejected in fight for blotting paper jobs". This was precisely what occurred to our friend as he listened to the radio that morning and decided on the stunt. Suspension is no big deal - he had no intention that day of spending even two minutes in the Chamber, anyway. He's too busy for that political nonsense. He has a whole shoal of letters to write to constituents (free stationery, free post) telling them of his concern about unemployment, prices and inflation. And his fight for blotting paper jobs.  The moves toward reform of the degenerate system operating in the Dail are cautious, conservative, fearful of upsetting the TDs — for it is they who presently abuse parliamentary democracy and who have the yea or nay on whether the abuse will continue.  The scandal of a Dail that sits, on average, a mere 87 days a year, TDs who have no legislative function, state cars, unaccountable spending, a massive backlog of Bills, a failure to legislate on a range of major and minor issues — a thousand increasingly obvious occasions of political sin have made some TDs sensitive to accusations of irrelevancy. The move is on to do something about clearing up the mess — or at least to appear to be doing so.  There is much to be cleared. The above description of the Order of Business stunt is no invention, merely a fictional representation of everyday behaviour. Such crudities are the norm. Usually it doesn't go as far as suspension — the TD merely disrupts proceedings long enough to get his name in the paper. Order of Business is a good time for it (you might make the 1.30 news), so is Question Time. But any old time will do.  John Kelly tells a story of the period 1973-75, when he was Government Whip and the Dail sat until 10.30pm, and he would regularly see some TD rise to his feet at about 8.45 in the evening. Having taken the right to speak, the TD would drone on and on, a dreary, pointless speech, knowing it was too late in the evening to get media coverage. However, by holding the floor until the Dail adjourned at 10.30 he would ensure that he would be first to speak next morning. "When, of course, the press would be in that gallery, brighteyed and bushytailed, ready for anything and particularly for a bit of fun. And willing to take down whatever the Deputy who had bored the ears off everybody the previous night — might have kept up his sleeve for the following morning."  There are many ways of screwing up the system, to get your name in the paper, to use the clout that the Dail has to help impress your constituents, to misuse and abuse public funds and institutions in the private interests of TDs. The examples given here are of activities observable most days in the Dail and most are based on comments made by TDs during recent debates on Dail reform. The moves toward changing the system that are described here are tentative, dependent on the initiative of a handful of TDs, at the mercy of the Buster Birdbrains.  There are several ways of looking at Wednesday January 26, 1983. You could see it as the day that Charlie Haughey almost sank in the wake of the tapping and bugging row - he was at home that night writing his resignation, they said.  You could see January 26 as the day John Bruton began the Dail debate on Dail reform. But for some of us January 26 will always be the day of The Great Written Question Joust.  Question Time works like this. Each day there is one hour put aside during which Ministers will answer questions asked of them by TDs. The TD writes down the question, sends it in, it goes on the list. Eventually, in several week's time, or several months, the Minister answers. In any hour of Question Time 20 questions may be answered. Or six. Out of hundreds on the list. Depends on how much disruption Buster Birdbrain gets up to. There is a shortcut. You can ask that your question receive a written reply, rather than be answered in person by the Minister. The drawback is that you don't get to ask supplementary questions, teasing out more information, or — if you're that way inclined — you don't get to cause a public row and maybe get your name in the papers. The advantage of a written reply is that it must be made within three days of the question being put down. The institution of the Dail question was designed to enable backbenchers to have some means of calling Ministers to account. It can be used to draw out important information on government policies and on social and political developments. In theory it's a good idea. In practice it's one of the most abused institutions in the Dail. TDs put down questions by the score which ask when so-and-so's phone will be installed, when will so-and-so get a suckling grant, why did so-and-so not get a pension? The questions have no parliamentary validity. They are a service provided by TDs to enhance their own image and win votes.  Because of the high volume of enquiries, the Departments of P&T and of Social Welfare take weeks or months to reply to personal enquiries - even from TDs. By putting the enquiry in the form of a Dail Question the TD jumps the queue and ensures that the answer will arrive within three days.  The Great Written Question Joust went like this. Bobby Molloy and Frank Fahey are TDs for Galway West, both members of Fianna Fail. It's the constituency where there's a surfeit of hopeful Fianna Failers and Fahey just squeezed out Mark Killilea last time. And it's where Michael D. Higgins is still there with a chance of getting back his seat. In other words, it's a tough constituency, lots of elbow digging, you can't afford to relax, every vote is to be struggled over.  On January 26 the Order Paper carried 183 questions from Frank Fahey, 125 from Bobby Molloy. It is impossible to say which questions were "justified", but scrutiny of the total of the 308 questions indicates that 26 of Fahey's appear to be of the type for which Question Time is intended - that is, questions which elicit information which might be generally useful - and 23 of Molloy's are of that type. That leaves a total of 259 questions the sale purpose of which is to use the TDs' position to impress constituents.  The fact is that such questions are meaningless. They don't affect reality one way or the other, they merely give the impression of power and of the willingness of TDs to use that power to buy votes.  The questions, to an extraordinary extent, reveal the carelessness and ineptitude of the TDs. Again and again and again and again the Ministerial answers point out that the phone was supplied six months ago or the grant was refused on obviously impeccable grounds. A large number of times the answer is that "nobody of that name has applied" for a telephone, grant or anything else.  In some instances both Fahey and Molloy ask the same questions and both questions appear together on the order paper — Fahey asks the Minister for Education if she will provide the money for a School of Music in Galway, (Question 978) and then Molloy asks if she's aware of the demand for a School of Music (979); Fahey asks about a school in Gort, Molloy asks about a school in Gort.  The cost of answering a Dail question (research, salaries, secretarial work, printing etc) varies depending on the information required. Some would cost £20 a go, others £50, others £100, some even £150. Taking a conservative average — £50 a question — it appears that on January 26 the electioneering (for it is no more than that) of Fahey and Molloy cost taxpayers about £12,950. This was a contribution by us to their election funds. It also gives them an advantage over any non-TD who might challenge them at the next election, thereby distorting democracy.  Molloy and Fahey don't get up to this kind of thing every day, not on the same scale. But there is a large number of TDs for whom this is a way of life, this is what the Dail exists for. Worse, some of the TDs don't put in such questions for written reply; they drag the Minister into the Dail to give an oral statement that "nobody of that name has applied" for a phone.  Incredibly, on January 26 Frank Fahey rose to speak on the need for Dail reform. John Bruton dryly suggested that Fahey shouldn't change the system until his questions were answered. Fahey said bluntly that he put down the questions because of the long delay in getting enquiries answered. He also claimed that he was "anxious to show up a really inefficient system — not in relation to the civil servants in those Departments but in relation to politics generally."  On February 3, Bertie Ahern intervened at Question Time, during a string of such questions, 'to ask if this was the best way of doing things. He was told that a TD had the right to put down a question concerning any subject for which he has a query. The Committee of Procedures and Privileges is unlikely to make any change in this system. It is too dear to too many TDs' hearts, would cause too much of a rear-up. There will probably be a change which will have a different Minister answering questions each day, rather than one Minister answering for several days as at present. It will make Question Time more interesting but not more productive or less corrupt.  The Publicity Game: another function of the Dail at present is to provide a forum in which reporters will take down speeches in which TDs show their concern. Even if there are no press reporters present the speech will be taken down by the Dail stenographers, printed, and the TD can send it to the local paper. There are methods by which TDs can raise issues of interest. Somewhat primitive methods, admittedly. Usually, the important thing is merely to get the thing on the record.  Raising an issue on The Adjournment means that a TD can stay back for half an hour after the usual business is finished and speak on some issue dear to his or her heart. The appropriate Minister must listen and reply. The Dail staff has to stay back an extra half-hour.  Usually, no other TD stays to listen. The TD speaks to an almost empty Chamber. Nothing is achieved, reality is not affected. Deciding the format in which to raise an issue can be a matter of whimsy or frustration. For instance, Tom McEllistrim recently wanted to ask a Private Notice Question and was ruled out of order.  "I was disappointed", he told the Dail, "that my Private Notice question was not accepted. The question was to ask .... " . The Ceann Comhairle wasn't about to allow McEllistrim trim sneak the question in and told him he couldn't discuss or argue the issue in the Chamber, he could discuss the matter privately with the Ceann Comhairle.  "I only wanted to know what steps the Minister for Industry and Energy had taken .... " "The Deputy is asking a question which has been disallowed." ". . . to prevent the closure of the .... " "Deputy McEllistrim is out of order. I am asking him to resume his seat." "There is a loss of 295 jobs .... " "I must rule Deputy McEllistrim out of order." "I want to raise this matter on the adjournment. "  McEllistrim hadn't started out to seek a half-hour of Dail time for his issue but ended up seeking it, on the spur of the moment.  One of the reasons for this kind of carry-on is the fact that backbench TDs have no function in the Dail except as voting fodder, and it is difficult for them to raise issues. Worse, there is no point in raising them, apart from publicity reasons, as there's nothing the Dail can do, unless the government agrees. The TDs are powerless.  Or the dodge of raising an issue on the Adjournment can be used as a threat. Take Bobby Molloy again, and again on January 26. Ruairi Quinn was answering questions on road repairs in the west. Molloy pursued him on one question and Quinn wasn't saying what Molloy wanted him to say. After a while, the Ceann Comhairle tried to move on to the next question. Molloy kept talking. The Ceann Comhairle said: "The Deputy is very much out of order now." Molloy kept going after Quinn. Quinn didn't say a word. The Ceann Comhairle called the next question. Before Quinn could move on to it Molloy was in: "Could I have a reply to the question which I put to the Minister? I do not want to bring him back on the Adjournment." The Ceann Comhairle then, despite his previous decision that the Dail had moved on to the next question, asked the Minister if he'd like to reply. Quinn replied.  The problem with the Dail is not just the juvenile antics of some TDs. It's also what the Dail doesn't do. There is the obvious failure to legislate on major issues, leaving them to be decided by the courts, the EEC or whatever. This is because there is currently a majority of politically impoverished TDs in the Dail, many without the courage of their convictions, others with no convictions to have the courage of. Thus, major issues such as marital breakdown linger on untended for years, as there are no votes in it. And TDs rush to support the Abortion Amendment as there may be votes to be lost if they don't.  There is, however, also a less obvious failure to legislate for minor issues. This is the fault of the system, not the TDs — except in so far as the TDs have lacked the will to change the system.  John Boland gave the Dail an example of this. He told of how Balbriggan and Skerries harbours were assigned by legislation long ago to the responsibility of the Dublin Port and Docks Board. The legislation was bad. The Board can charge a maximum of 50p per year for the use of the harbour. With a fleet of 25 boats using the harbour the income is derisory. Therefore, the Board doesn't want the harbour, doesn't maintain it, can't get rid of it. The logical thing to do would be transfer responsibility to the local authority and set up realistic harbour fees. That needs legislation. There is no way that the Dail is going to bother with such a small issue, or with any of the countless other issues of that type.  The usual way this works is that it's agreed that next time there is appropriate general legislation this matter will be slipped into a paragraph. Of course, the general legislation is never quite appropriate; the thing is left as it is. Boland: "It is a daft state of affairs that after all my years in this House I cannot introduce a single-section Bill at some stage, getting the House to agree to assign to the local authority the responsibility now resting with the Dublin Port and Docks Board."  The British House of Commons has updated its procedures to the extent that such matters can be dealt with legislation can be enacted which is useful, practical. It is possible that this is one of the reforms which may be made in the Dail in the future, perhaps allocating Fridays to such Bills, giving the ordinary TD some practical function in legislating. And the issues need not be local, they might be matters affecting the population at large but ones with which the Dail doesn't bother itself at present.  Back in 1971/72 Des O'Malley chaired a committee on Dail reform. He has admitted that the committee was "not adventurous". Back then there wasn't so much public awareness or criticism of the mess. Barry Desmond argued the case for reform in the mid-seventies. These days the moves are being led by John Bruton, Bertie Ahern, Sean Barrett and Charlie Haughey. Haughey is probably the most cautious of the lot, but when he expresses reservations about some of Bruton's enthusiasms they are serious, not penny-ante stuff.  Ahern and Barrett seem committed enough. Bruton has initially been concentrating on introducing a workable committee system. This will be experimented with during the summer recess. The Committee on Procedures and Privileges has been discussing the outmoded voting system, the lack of debate on financial matters before commitments are made (since the introduction of economic planning in 1958 there has not been a single Dail discussion on economic plans — they are merely "laid before the House", ie, a copy is left in the Dail library. TDs have no input), the curtailing of long pointless speeches, the Order of Business (one suggestion being that before the Dail adjourns in the evening the Order of Business for the next day be read out — so that the Buster Birdbrains wouldn't be able to get publicity by disrupting it) and several other aspects.  Some TDs quite transparently want some cosmetic changes, to make the Dail "look more professional", to alleviate criticism without making any substantial changes. Others are equally obviously disgusted with some of the behaviour. Some know that without change the alienation of the public will increase. And there are the Birdbrains, happy to squander public money and subvert an institution which they ostensibly revere as the centrepiece of democracy. Getting elected is what it is about. And the vast majority of TDs retire or die having — despite the obsequious tributes they get — achieved little more than having been there.  It is being said that the Dail is being reformed. That has not yet been decided. There are some moves in that direction.