Dailwatch - Raising Questions

Professor John Kelly, TD, former Minister, lecturer, author and wit was slumped in his backbench, holding up a watch. The watch had an expanding strap. Below him, the debate on the Finance Bill, the Bill which might that day have brought down the government, was in progress. Kelly held the watch up to his face, pulled the strap so that it expanded, brought it closer to his face, let the strap contract and pinch the tip of his nose. He looked at the watch again, pinched the tip of his nose again.

You have to be doing something. John Bruton found another way to pass the time. He came into the chammber carrying a large pile of papers, as thick as two telephone books, with maybe a Yellow Pages thrown in. It might have been that he had the goods on Ray McSharry and was about to use his facts and figures to rip apart the Minister's arguments. It might have been that he had found transscripts of Dail telephone calls.

Then he began signing the bottom of each sheet of paper. Bruton was answering his mail, signing letters, hundreds of them.

The debate went on, nobody payying too much attention. The vote was the thing that mattered.

Barry Desmond was referring to "the three Workers' Party so-called deputies" and Proinsias de Rossa was on his feet to protest. "A point of order", he called.

John O'Connell, Ceann Comhairle, wanted to let de Rossa get in with his point of order.

"I'm speaking on a point of order", said Barry Desmond.

"Oh are you?", said O'Connell, and de Rossa sat down.

Desmond continued speaking on the Finance Bill and when O'Connell wanted to know what the point of order was Desmond said that, sure, wasn't he speaking on the Amendment to the Finance Bill?

"The deputy was deliberately missleading the chair!" complained O'Connnell.

Desmond shrugged, apologised all round and continued. John Bruton was a third of the way through his lettters. Michael O'Leary welcomed the spirit of loquaciousness in the Dail but wanted to get on with the vote.

Someone had asked Neil Blaney earlier on what he thought were the chances of the government falling. None. Why? Nobody wants an election.

The government didn't fall.

The main heat in the debate on the Finance Bill had to do with snipping at each other by Fine Gael and the Workers' Party. Ray McSharry did say that he was sympathetic to John Bruuton's plea that he reduce the VAT on lampshades from 30% to 18% but he wasn't prepared to widen the scope and this was the dilemma of a Minister for FinanB'

Paddy Gallagher got all upset about the Coalition budget-having been based on the theories of Milton Frieddman and Tom FitzPatrick got all uppset about the fact that Gallagher was reading from a script and not speaking off the cuff. Gallagher said that Fine Gael had given the Workers' Party no reason to substitute them for Fianna Fail in government.

Peter Barry said that the governnment was completely in the hands of Sinn Fein The Workers' Party. Joe Sherlock rose from his seat like someeone had just said a dirty word. "There", he spaced out the words, "is no . . . such ... organisation."

Peter Barry looked puzzled for a second, like he might have said someething he didn't mean to say ... and after he'd referred a time or two more to Sinn Fein the Workers' Party and Sherlock had again protested, Barry shook his head and smiled. "I keep on slipping into that mistake, isn't it terrible?"

That was the day that the second stage of the Bill went through, courtesy of the abstention of the three WP deputies. For most of that section of the debate, from about 9pm onnwards, there was just a scattering of TDs lounging in their seats. Twentyyseven Fianna Fail, six Fine Gael, one Labour, one WP. The figures went up and down in ones and twos until it was time for a vote and the rest of the TDs started drifting in.

Michael O'Leary sat down on the steps near Barry Desmond for a chat. Bertie Ahern sat down on the steps near Ben Briscoe for a chat. O'Leary got up and went out, Joe Sherlock came in. Alan Shatter came in for a minute, then Shatter went out and Tony Gregory came in. Bertie Ahern got up and went out.

The Order Paper for that day had 1060 questions for Ministers, about a quarter of the questions for written answer. The Dail got through 31 of them. Liam Naughton, of Fine Gael and Roscommon, wasn't happy about the answer to one of his questions so he asked permission to raise a question on the adjournment.

Raising a question on the adjournnment is a phrase that annoys a lot of people in the Dail, mostly the ushers and other people who actually do some work around the place. It means that when the business of the day is over some TD gets up and spouts for twenty minutes and the Minister dealling with the area being spouted on will reply for ten minutes. It's not so bad if this happens at Spm - but when it happens at 1 Opm it means that you're in danger of missing the last bus, and maybe even the last pint.

Liam Naughton got his twenty minutes immediately after the vote on the second stage of the Finance Bill. As he talked on and on about local authority houses the TDs left their benches, chatting and laughing, and strolled out. Some of them stood in the lobbies behind Naughton, chatttering. The Ceann Comhairle called for order and the hubbub toned down for a few seconds, then continued as before.

John Farrelly and Oliver J. Flanaagan of Fine Gael sat on, the only ones listening to Naughton. Even the Miniister didn't seem too interested. Howwever, the point of these things is not to achieve an exchange of views or to get anything done. The point is that TDs can get reports of such speeches into the local paper and tell constiituents about how they have raised the problem in the highest forum in the land.

After about five minutes even Oliver J. got browned off and wandered out.