Some of the finest TDs in the Dáil are Fianna Fáil backbenchers, claims Vincent Browne
I am thinking of the likes of Seán Ardagh, Pat Carey, Barry Andrews, Jimmy Devins, Seán Fleming, Jim Glennon, Máire Hoctor, John McGuinness, John Moloney and Peter Power. Each one of these has more talent and ability than many of those in Government. More ability than a few in the Cabinet. And yet they have no power at all, no influence, well, almost no influence. Not just that, no role.
True, some of them are chairpersons of committees, but what influence does that give them? Most of these went through the Government lobbies recently (or was it e-voting?) in support of the Garda Bill. They had no input into the Bill, no say on what it contained or didn't contain, certainly no say whatsoever in the 170-plus amendments Michael McDowell introduced at the last minute. And yet convention required they vote for the Bill; not just convention but party rules.
Party rules dictate that if a Fianna Fáil TD votes against the government (that is when Fianna Fáil is in office) he or she is disciplined.
Party rules do not dictate that policy decisions, all policy decisions, are taken by the Fianna Fáil Parliamentary Party and only when a TD votes against what a majority in the parliamentary party has decided is he or she disciplined. That is because the parliamentary party decides almost nothing.
At times the parliamentary party is listened to by ministers and the views expressed there are taken into consideration. But in no sense whatsoever does the parliamentary party decide policy; that is decided by ministers and the parliamentary party is expected to follow along. Not just that, but to defend that which is decided without their involvement.
Never, apparently, do any of the above-mentioned able and robust TDs complain. Never has one of them, as far as I am aware, stood up at a parliamentary party meeting and said: all policy decisions must be made here before backbenchers are expected to vote for them, and if they are not decided here, then a free vote must operate.
That would be democratic. That would be unacceptable.
The hilarity of a few weeks ago when the Fianna Fáil backbenchers put a halt to Michael McDowell's cafe-bars brainchild (actually it was the brainchild of the taskforce on liquor licensing but it got backs up because it was Michael McDowell who was sponsoring the plan) was a rare and permissible revolt by the backbenchers over being taken for granted. But that they had to do this on a PD-sponsored initiative and then on something as marginal as cafe-bars was illustrative of their impotence generally.
Nobody seems to think there is something seriously wrong with a procedure whereby the government of the day, through the enforced support of its backbenchers, decides all policy, inspires all legislation, accedes only where it suits it to accountability to the Dáil, never or at least rarely acceding to democracy even within its own party.
For the electorate it means they elect TDs whose sole independent function is to elect a taoiseach and then, if not included in the Cabinet, shut up.
The emasculation of the legislature is a serious infringement of the constitutional independence and role of the law-makers but, it seems, there is no way the courts would intervene to protect the integrity of the legislature, for, theoretically, the legislature can be said to be independent, when in practice everyone knows this is a nonsense.
There is a convention that the judiciary stays aloof from how the legislature works. But can this be an absolute? What if the law-makers voted to expel a member indefinitely because they thought the member in question was, for instance, a communist? Or voted to expel 20 members or voted to adjourn the Dáil for all but one day a week? Would the courts stand idly by then?
More realistically, why don't the likes of Seán Ardagh, Pat Carey, Barry Andrews, Jimmy Devins, Seán Fleming, Jim Glennon, Máire Hoctor, John McGuinness, John Moloney and Peter Power, indeed all 52 Fianna Fáil backbenchers, get together and put it up to Bertie Ahern at the next parliamentary party meeting that if policies are not endorsed by the parliamentary party in advance of being introduced to the Dáil, there will be no requirement on backbenchers to obey the party whip? Not just cafe-bars, everything.
They might, for instance, have had something to say about the Dáil going into recess for three months. In any meaningful sense, did the Dáil decide this or did the Government, which supposedly is responsible to the Dáil, decide it didn't want to be even theoretically accountable until September 28th?
Yes, we know the bit about Oireachtas committees which will be working throughout the summer and all that blarney.
Take for instance this current week. Today two committees will meet and tomorrow two committees will meet, each for a few hours, involving in all 44 TDs, that is if they all show up.
So let's start a new campaign: Free the Fianna Fáil 52.