As politicians settle into the long summer recess a Government Minister has given them something to chew over after describing Dáil performances as “boring”.
Throwing down the gauntlet to Irish TDs and senators to up the ante and make themselves more interesting to the public, Minister for Community, Equality, and Gaeltacht Affairs Pat Carey has said what passes for debate in Leinster House is “uninspiring and unenlightening”.
Dáil debates are “too dull, too structured, too formal, and too contrived”, and reform is needed to make them less dull and uninspiring, said the Minister, who blamed the boredom factor as the reason why a “public sense of disconnect” exists.
“A lot of our business is conducted under the tyranny of the script, a situation that leads to an overall sense of listening to a ghost-written debate. And, as with the ghost-written autobiography of the Premiership soccer star or soap actor, we are sometimes left less than convinced by the authenticity of the author’s voice and what they are speaking, or rather reading, about,” said Minister Carey.
Speaking at the McGill Summer School this week, the Minister added that even when members are debating matters on which they hold passionate and informed views, their passion and understanding is often “lost in recitation”.
He suggested that a package of Parliamentary reforms, including the restriction of reading from scripts, should be introduced to create greater efficiency and address negative public attitudes towards the work of Dáil Éireann.
“Unless we do something about it we may even lose ‘the drunks and insomniacs’ who Pat Rabbitte famously identified as making up the audience for RTÉ’s Oireachtas Report,” Minister Carey concluded.
