The Senate: A last refuge for scoundrels?

The new Senate - like most before it - is a mixture of failed TDs, would-be TDs, party hacks and hopefuls. It contributes little to the affairs of the nation. Is the Senate ... a last refuge for scoundrels?

The Senate costs the taxpayer appproximately £1.5m per year. It sits an average of 30 days per year. It conntributes almost nothing to the legisslative process, but a great deal to the personal careers of individual senators. Traditionally, it has been the reposiitory for failed TDs or political hacks. More recently it has become the launnching pad for future TDs.

The supposition that the Senate provides an upper chamber of "exxpert" representatives chosen from the elite of the professions and vocational bodies is entirely groundless. Very few senators - about 10 - make a .substantial contribution to the second chamber. The rest, whatever expertise they might coincidentally possess, have been elected because of their ability to twist arms among the counntry's county councillors, or wrestle favours from political parties.

In theory, the Senate is supposed to be a broadly based think-tank from which all passing legislation will emmerge considerably improved. That this does, in fact, sometimes happen at all has to do only with the efforts of a very few outstanding individuals. The vast majority of senators will conntribute nothing to debates, will table no amendments, but will use the perks that go with the jo b - salary, travellling allowance, secretarial services, free postage and telephones, and the chance of personal publicity - to do the party political, geographically based constiituency work that will launch a new career in the Dail, save a dying one, prop up a party colleague, or keep a "family" constituency warm for the next line for a particular dynasty.

In the last Senate (1981-1982),40 per cent of senators were defeated Dail candidates. The numbers this time are roughly the same, although in the meantime, a whole crop of would-be deputies have successfully crossed the divide into the Dail. Six

of Fine Gael's new deputies (Maurice Manning, Liam Naughton, Alexis FitzzGerald, Richard Bruton, Donal Carey, Gemma Hussey) launched their careers in the 1981 senate. Fianna Fail depuuties Jimmy Leonard and Joe Walsh, and Labour's Ruairi Quinn used the '81 Senate as the place from which they regained the Dail seats they had lost in the June '81 General Election.

In the current Senate there are about eight ambitious career launchers who have set their sights on the Dail and have a chance of making it (Moniica Barnes, Donie Cassidy, Dick Dowlling, Mary O'Rourke, Joachim Loughhrey, Katherine Bulbulia, Sean Conway, Sean Fallon). There are a further five who, once TDs, have retreated into the Senate until the next general elecction (Madeleine Taylor, Tom Hussey, Charlie McDonald, Mark Killilea, Michhael Smith). Judging from the performmance of the last Dail, some of these might make good senators. Others will use the Senate to continue the constituency work they did as depuuties,' thus ensuring a build-up of local support before the next Dail election.

The recent influx of career launchers into the Senate has, incidentally, immproved the level of debate simply beecause it is in the particular individual's career interest to be seen to make inntelligent contributions. It is not in the interest of the career launchers that the Senate be publicly perceived as an ineffectual chamber which acts as a retirement home for political hacks.

The last Leader of the House, Gemma Hussey, was also one of the most politically ambitious members of the upper chamber. In her time in that position, she made a serious attempt to improve the prestige and influence of the Senate. (She didn't succeed, mainnly because her term of office was short lived, but also because a large number of senators and the main political parties aren't concerned about the Senate's lack of prestige .). >

Traditionally, the Senate waits to receive legislation from the Dail. Offten it can wait for months and then be faced at the end of the term with a build up of work which the governnment wants "processed" through the house as quickly as possible. Senator Hussey encouraged the practice of beeginning legislation, not in the Dail, but in the Senate. In a time when, traditioonally, the Senate would have been waiting for legislation, six bills were initiated in the last Senate. The one that is particularly interesting is the Criminal Justice Bill (abolition of the death penalty). The debate was not hamstrung by party political affiliation and broadened to consider such mattters as the nature of prison. It is posssible, had a general election not interrvened, that the debate in the Senate might have increased public awareness on such an important human rights issue, therefore improving the nature of the debate before it got into the more politically motivated chamber of the Dail.

However, this last Senate, though full of good intentions, was probably the least effective in recent years, mainly because its lifespan was too short. It succeeded in amending no legislation at all, although there is a Senate amendment currently before the Oireachtas, but it is at odds with the present Government and is doommed to failure. The previous Senate 0977-1981) successfully tabled 110 amendments. (However, this involved the efforts of a minority of active Sennators.) All these amendments were accepted by the relevant Minister and incorporated into the legislation which was eventually passed by the Dail, which means that they weren't poliitically controversial amendments but rather, technical improvements to the wording of the bills. This is where the supposed expertise of the senators can be of some use, although it tends to be the same few that make any impact at all. Former Senator, Catheerine McGuinness remembers that her expertise as a barrister was of partiicular use when the new consumer legislation was going through the Sennate. She successfully suggested several amendments that were accepted by the Minister and made the legislation more workable.

However, a panel of experts able to offer technical advice to improve legisslation, is slim justification for a group of 60 people, each paid £7,619 to work a 30 day year, (£254 per day, plus travelling expenses, free postage, phones, offices, secretarial services, and subsidised lunches). That almost all the talented and ambitious senators are merely stopping off en route to the Dail, is an indication of the lack of influence of the upper chamber àit simply isn't the place where most serious politicians want to be. Another indication is the lack of ministerial talent to emerge from the Senate and the uproar caused when Senator Jim Dooge received a Ministerial appointtment.

It is not only unlikely, but pracctically inconceivable, that the Senate will ever significantly change. By deesign it acts as a prop to the established political parties. It will always reflect the elected strength of political parties, and will, given the failsafe of the Taoiiseach's eleven nominees, always have a Government majority. It is in the interest of none of the political parties to change the Senate because it is ennormously useful to them in terms of party strategy. They can use the Sennate to build up party strength in parrticular areas. Also, the Senate can be used to ensure that the vote-getting constituency work of a particularly busy TD or minister doesn't flag.

At least nine of the present crop of senators use the office as a base from which to do a party colleague's connstituency work (Richard Hourigan, Joseph Lennon, John Mannion, Willliam Ryan, Deirdre Bolger, Michael Howard, Toddie Beirne, Denis Creegan, Brian Mullooly). In some cases the tacit agreement is - a seat in the Sennate in exchange for constituency work and a guarantee that the local TD won't be challenged from within his own party. This tactic is useful for marginal constituencies and for headding off politically ambitious people in constituencies where there isn't room for another Dail candidate. Since, theoretically, the Senate has no geoographically based constituencies, there is no justification for constituency work (or free postage used to that end), but in fact except in a very few cases, the parties expect their senators to do it. Some of the exceptions are the "backroorn boys", the party orgaanisers who have got their Senate seats as a reward for years of party work, and the few serious career senators such as Eoin Ryan, and the university senators.

It is often argued that the univerrsity seats are the only democratic ones in the Senate in that they have an elecctorate outside the party political struccture. However, the electorate consists of an elite of college graduates from Trinity College and the National Uniiversity. Inequitably, the considerably smaller electorate of TCD elects three senators as does the larger body of National University graduates. At the time the Senate was established this was done as a sop to the Protestant minority. It is harder to justify now.  

Also, if third level educational input into the Senate is important it is hard to justify seats for Trinity College or the National University but not for the NIHE or the vocational colleges. Desspite the elitist nature of the University seats, they have produced some of our outstanding senators, and represent the only independent (non-party) voice in the Senate.

Because the Senate is effectively subordinate to the Dail and therefore the Government, the extent to which it will be active and effective depends largely on whether or not the Governnment wishes it to be. The Government can decide whether or not to initiate legislation in the Senate or keep the Senate waiting until legislation has gone through the Dail. Government ministers can be hard to pin down to attend Senate debates which can't take place without them. It is possible that a government will view the Senate simply as a body through which legisslation must pass, as quickly as possible.

Although the leader of the new Seenate, Eoin Ryan, is well known as a serious senator and certainly is Fainna Fail's heavyweight within the chamber, it is expected that his first committment will be to processing Governnment legislation as quickly and efficciently as suits the Government. Given the knife edge majority of Fianna Fail within the Dail, it is unlikely that lengthy debate and controversy will be encouraged in the Senate. •