THE SEANAD’S Committee on Members’ Interests does not have powers to investigate complaints against former senators, members of the Seanad confirmed yesterday.
Several Senators said the committee could not conduct an investigation of a complaint unless it referred to a current Senator.
They were responding to the disclosure in The Irish Times that former senator Don Lydon had changed his normal place of residence from Dublin to Donegal in 2004.
The Senators said there could be no basis for the committee to consider the matter as Mr Lydon had not been a member of the Seanad since losing his seat in 2007. The committee has examined the cases of three current Senators, who were elected from Dublin addresses but later changed their normal place of residence to addresses outside Dublin.
A legal challenge by Senator Ivor Callely against the committee’s decision to suspend him for 20 sitting days of the Seanad is before the courts.
Several senators who spoke to The Irish Times yesterday said there was a need for the standing orders that defined normal place of residence to be tightened up to prevent anomalies.
The Senators spoke anonymously because of sensitivities surrounding the case being taken by Mr Callely. A Green Party Senator said the normal place of residence should be the place where the person votes, and receives all bills. Another said a number of yardsticks should be applied, including where the sentator’s office was located or where clinics were held.
Mr Lydon told the Oireachtas in 2004 that he had changed his normal residence from Stillorgan in Dublin, to Killybegs, in Donegal. In the following 3½ years he claimed €146,059 in travel and subsistence expenses from the Donegal address.