The future of the Senate

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PMI

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Did anyone see the Late Late Show tonight. I was not suprised that the Senators tried to justify themselves, but the arrogance and the cheek of Donie Cassidy was nothing short of disgraceful. When it was brought to his attention that a person who was shoned by the electorate in the Dail election can be given a job in the senate, he stated, "Whats wrong with that?".

They tried to play around with technicalities to give the impression that they work more then an average of two days a week.
They tried to justify as democratic, the means of which they are elected or indeed, gifted the job.
They tried to make us believe that the PM's nominated senators would not just be "yes" men for the Government.
They completely ignored the payments and expenses which they are paid.

My opinion is that the Senate does nothing for our democracy and should not be reformed but shut down
 
Fine Gael shot themselves in the foot big time not appearing. What are they trying to hide?
 
The brass neck of Ian O'Doherty from the Indo complaining about patronage got my goat. Does anyone really think that Gavin O'Reilly would be CEO of Independent Newspapers if his surname was not 'O'Reilly' and he wasn't the son of the Chairman and largest shareholder.
 
Complainer said:
The brass neck of Ian O'Doherty from the Indo complaining about patronage got my goat. Does anyone really think that Gavin O'Reilly would be CEO of Independent Newspapers if his surname was not 'O'Reilly' and he wasn't the son of the Chairman and largest shareholder.
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How do you know O'Doherty is not equally disgusted with such nepotism?

He was there to debate the senate and he voiced his opinion.

For what it is worth, I don't think the senate should be abolished but the role of senator should be a voluntary one without remuneration.
 
room305 said:
How do you know O'Doherty is not equally disgusted with such nepotism?

He was there to debate the senate and he voiced his opinion.
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What kind of person takes a wage from an organisation that disgusts him?

Mind you, White from Labour ignored the question of why he takes the wage given his concerns about the value of the Senate.
 
Complainer said:
What kind of person takes a wage from an organisation that disgusts him?
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I never said the entire organisation disgusts him (and I don't even know the man) but you cannot infer the nepotism at the top of the organisation doesn't. Do you presume every employee at Anglo Irish bank is happy with the actions of Seanie Fitz and the gang?

Would you resign from your job if it became clear one of the bosses was engaged in something untoward? Should every decent employee of FAS resign or face your rancour for the actions of the gombeens running the place?
 
room305 said:
For what it is worth, I don't think the senate should be abolished but the role of senator should be a voluntary one without remuneration.
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Agree. As an interim measure ahead of any reform of the senate, the government needs to go back to the situation that pertained before Noel Dempsey gave them salaries. At that point they just got expenses, which were substantial and which most of them were happy enough with for this part-time job.
The other urgent reform that is needed is the issue of the Taoiseach's nominees. Currently, this is used as a reward for failed politicians or as a training ground for new ones. It would be better used to bring leaders in various aspects of society into the senate, for instance John O'Shea of Goal could represent the voluntary sector (just an example), or other people with a track record and the necessary intellectual skills to add value to the upper house.
 
I would suggest the abolition of the Taoiseach's nominees and put those seats out to election by the general populous.

It is sickening to hear when a certain FF TD of 20 years has lost his seat in a general election only to be appointed as a senator 3 weeks later.
 
All the nominees need to be culled from the Senate with the exception of the up to 2 experts that the Taoiseach is allowed appoint as Ministers.

I see no point in direct elections that mirror Dail elections - you'd just get a replica of the Dail which would serve no purpose.

The university seats should be significantly expanded. The TCD and NUI Senators are the only ones who seem to do their jobs as intended. All universities should have seats. This is very meritocratic.

There should be a drastic overhaul of the elections for the other seats. They are supposed to represent various strands of Irish society. The people elected to these seats should be directly elected by the sections of society they represent, not by political lapdogs or councillors.
 
I'm not a fan of Pat Kenny but he put it up to Donie Cassidy on a few occasions during the debate.
 
I did read that the job of the lower house is to represent the people's interests.

But the upper house can be seen to reflect opinion.

Example: if everybody wanted war, then the TDs would also want war, as they represent people wishes.

But the senator should be there to give a different opinion, which may not reflect what people want.

After all, what is popular is often not for the greater good.

Many Irish people want one-off houses, and weak councillors give in to that, even though it is not for the greater good of society.
 
Mucker Man said:
I'm not a fan of Pat Kenny but he put it up to Donie Cassidy on a few occasions during the debate.
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I agree with this. I thought it was an excellent debate and would like if the Late Late show started doing items like this more often. There was plenty of audience participation and I thought Pat Kenny handled it all very well.
 
Personally I thought Pat Kenny was pretty biased in attacking the senate and its senators.

Let there be reform in the Senate if it is needed, but to justify it's abolition just because of the money it costs to run it rests uneasy with me...It ended up sounding a little like a witch hunt on Friday. We're talking about democracy and surely we should be VERY careful when we start attacking its institutions!

I never remember anyone condemning or questioning the Senate during the 80s recession, so why is there such focus on it now?
 
Fair play to Kenny, he did a great job with the senators. Crowd really got involved, comical seeing that Donnie guy firstly defending how they're appointed then refusing to agree to a pay cut..
just shows the mood of the masses...
 
room305 said:
I never said the entire organisation disgusts him (and I don't even know the man) but you cannot infer the nepotism at the top of the organisation doesn't. Do you presume every employee at Anglo Irish bank is happy with the actions of Seanie Fitz and the gang?

Would you resign from your job if it became clear one of the bosses was engaged in something untoward? Should every decent employee of FAS resign or face your rancour for the actions of the gombeens running the place?
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I've certainly made career decisions to find an employer where my value system aligns with the organisation's value system. I'm not suggesting that every FAS employee should resign, but I would suggest that it would not be wise for them to go on the Late Late complaining about board junkets.

Still, O'Doherty has a neck like the jockey's proverbials, so I guess a touch of fairness would be too much to hope for.
 
While the Upper house is not elected by the people (but is yet another collection of special interest groups) it should not be able to disrupt the decisions of the lower house which is elected by universal franchise. So basically ‘til the Senate is elected democratically by all of the people the government should have an automatic majority. That was Dev’s thinking and he was right.
 
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