2016: A Reform Mandate?

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 4:59pm #1

I was thinking about the Mahon Tribunal and its findings of endemic corruption, as well as this article: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2012/0326/1224313893518.html

In terms of national politics, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael were born of Civil War divisions, rather than having competing visions about how to shape society. After the laying of the State’s foundations, the practice of politics became about the spoils of the system rather than engagement with ideas about the nature of citizenship. It was about management rather than vision. It was also about, in a society so homogeneously Catholic, abrogating responsibility to the Catholic church in too many crucial areas, including education, with a resultant narrow focus on what constituted immorality.

...

As we edge towards the centenary of the events that comprised the revolution of the early 20th century, we face a stark conclusion: this is a State bereft of meaningful sovereignty due to its bankruptcy and a State whose governing culture has been exposed as rotten.

We may have little to cheer about in 2016.

As many of you will know, I have a tendency to harp on about the Whip system and the way that the Dáil, far from holding the executive to account, is a mere rubber-stamp for Cabinet-based government in a system in which the party bosses promote or demote local representatives to Ministerial positions according to party interests rather than competence.

Something occurred to me as a possibility for the 2016 elections - and indeed subsequent ones, and I thought I might give it an airing here.

It rests on a couple of assumptions:

1. the majority of TDs are essentially no more than lobby fodder, serving no particular purpose in Leinster House other than providing the government majority.

2. the Government - that is, the executive itself - is not constitutionally required to command a majority in the Dáil. The government is formed by the Dáil electing a Taoiseach, and the Taoiseach appointing Ministers from among the TDs.

3. as a general rule, it seems that when political parties achieve office, they very rapidly cease to hold anyone or anything to account, and concentrate instead on redistributing the spoils of office (2,500 quango board seats in the direct gift of Ministers)

4. Independents by themselves tend, if anything, to be the most parochial of the parochial, agreeing to support the government in return for local pork projects - and tend to be elected on that basis.

5. we urgently need government reform.

6. I don't see any party in the current arrangement as genuinely looking for proper reform.

So, a suggestion. For 2016, run independent candidates up and down the country under a single banner of a Reform Mandate. The candidates pledge that if elected, they will act first and foremost to hold the government to account, and to press for reform. That means:

1. no deals with the government - an 'expulsion' and 'name and shame' policy in respect of anyone breaking the pledge

2. agreeing to support as Taoiseach whoever makes the most credible commitment to reform.

3. voting to support legislative proposals strictly on a conscience basis, not as a 'party'

4. being prepared to withdraw their support from the current Taoiseach on the basis of inadequate progress in respect of reform

5. being prepared to withdraw their support from the current Taoiseach on the basis of accountability for the executive more generally

6. proper review of Ministerial SIs rather than the current rubber-stamping regime

It seems to me that you might in this way be able to tie together a sufficient number of independents to make a numerical difference in the Dáil - ideally to hold the balance of power - and to use that voting weight to push for real reform as opposed to just changing the snouts in the trough.

Thoughts?

cordially,
Scofflaw

Dannyboy83 · 28-03-2012 5:20pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

Thoughts?

Probably one of the better suggestions I've heard in a while, altho it falls down in two areas:

A) People are all 'reformed' out. I think the electorate will be far too cynical by the time the next election rolls around, they've been fed too many lies already to really get motivated about reform now.
Seems to me, a lot of people are planning to protest by voting Sinn Fein or otherwise just not participate.

The plan requires decent & honourable people to elected. They're not usually the people who win local popularity contests in Ireland........for whatever reason.:(
So what would 'expulsion' entail?

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 5:43pm

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

Probably one of the better suggestions I've heard in a while, altho it falls down in two areas:

A) People are all 'reformed' out. I think the electorate will be far too cynical by the time the next election rolls around, they've been fed too many lies already to really get motivated about reform now.

Sure - but that's what political campaigning under a country-wide banner is for! I also think some of the apathy reflects the rather half-assed nature of the 'reform' movement at the last election (and, to be fair, there wasn't a lot of time to get going).

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

Seems to me, a lot of people are planning to protest by voting Sinn Fein or otherwise just not participate.

And one would hope to capture that vote - which exists, perhaps, because people aren't necessarily "all reformed out".

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

The plan requires decent & honourable people to elected. They're not usually the people who win local popularity contests in Ireland........for whatever reason.:(

True - not much we can do about that except take the chance, I think.

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

So what would 'expulsion' entail?

Not being able to stand under the banner again, public expulsion as having done whatever deal was done. There's only so much one can do, because I don't think a contractual obligation to step down is enforceable over the public mandate given by election, although other breach of contract penalties would be...

It would be possible, I think, to give the Reform Pledge the legal status of a contract, with penalties for breach of contract, most likely financial. That gives signing up to it something of a more serious character than just a verbal commitment.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Laminations · 28-03-2012 5:45pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

So, a suggestion. For 2016, run independent candidates up and down the country under a single banner of a Reform Mandate. The candidates pledge that if elected, they will act first and foremost to hold the government to account, and to press for reform. That means:

1. no deals with the government - an 'expulsion' and 'name and shame' policy in respect of anyone breaking the pledge

2. agreeing to support as Taoiseach whoever makes the most credible commitment to reform.

3. voting to support legislative proposals strictly on a conscience basis, not as a 'party'

4. being prepared to withdraw their support from the current Taoiseach on the basis of inadequate progress in respect of reform

5. being prepared to withdraw their support from the current Taoiseach on the basis of accountability for the executive more generally

6. proper review of Ministerial SIs rather than the current rubber-stamping regime

It seems to me that you might in this way be able to tie together a sufficient number of independents to make a numerical difference in the Dáil - ideally to hold the balance of power - and to use that voting weight to push for real reform as opposed to just changing the snouts in the trough.

Thoughts?

cordially,
Scofflaw

Good idea but needs a lot of fleshing out. You need to have a specific definition for the reform you talk about. Point 2 above might lead to a well intentioned but unsuitable Taoiseach - should a reform agenda trump all other criteria? Joe Higgins is probably the most vocal on reform but I'd hate to see him as Taoiseach. Point 3 above is nice in theory but if you don't have like minds then you don't get consensus on anything. What one person deems unconscionable, another may deem as necessary.

I see 4 areas for reform (in no particular order)

1. Local government and the separation of local issues from national politics. I've suggested the following.There definitely needs to be a separation in local/community affairs and national governance. The end of constituency clinics would be a start. Any local issues are taken to the council (who are voted in at senior positions by the people). Bi-weekly or monthly town hall meetings would then be the forum to raise national issues and get updates from your TD. These public meetings would be attended (on stage) by any government or opposition TDs for that area and anyone from the council or with some reasonable mandate intending to run for a national seat to voice their concerns and share their views. They'd be independently moderated and take questions from the audience (the local community). Discussion of local issues would not be permitted here unless it was an issue resulting from national policy. This would end the behind closed doors clinic meetings which lack transparency and waste TDs time.

People may criticise such a system by saying that local councillors who have a local presence and solve local issues daily would then be voted to national office and TDs would lose out. But I think the distinction would mean people are more likely to retain good councillors and only 'promote' them on the back of a good performance at the town hall meetings where they could demonstrate their suitability for the Dail and national politics.

2. Accountability - anyone found in breach of SIPO step down immediately or are removed with ramifications for their pensions. All expenses must be vouched and are capped on a departmental basis. Holidays are shortened and Dail sitting hours lengthened. Removing the TDs from constituency clinic work will allow them to concentrate on national issues and debate policies. Also replacing private clinic meetings with public town hall meetings will force TDs to go back to their communities, update the electorate on progress made and account for their decisions. Ministerial calenders are published so we can see them working for us, and there are no under the radar meetings with businessmen or lobby groups, which leads to..

3. True transparency - Published calenders. End corporate donations. Any private donation over 50 euro cannot be anonymous. All fundraising events and efforts need to be made public, no monies can enter party coffers outside of these events. TDs must declare all assets and interests in their name and names of direct relatives. The government should focus more on giving the public digestible information on its visions, projects and progress through quarterly state of the nation addresses and website updates - they need to use Gantt charts more!

4. Solidarity - Politicians pay and that of senior civil servants need to be linked to GDP or budget deficit or some measure of the country's economic well-being. Pensions should be cut to reflect the job prospects that lie beyond a political life. Very few politicians exit their profession onto the dole queue - even shysters get work like this.

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 5:52pm

Laminations wrote: »

Good idea but needs a lot of fleshing out. You need to have a specific definition for the reform you talk about. Point 2 above might lead to a well intentioned but unsuitable Taoiseach - should a reform agenda trump all other criteria? Joe Higgins is probably the most vocal on reform but I'd hate to see him as Taoiseach.

He also probably couldn't deliver.

Laminations wrote: »

Point 3 above is nice in theory but if you don't have like minds then you don't get consensus on anything. What one person deems unconscionable, another may deem as necessary.

Yes - it's intentional, though, that there not be required to be a consensus on exactly what constitutes the necessary reform, because the idea isn't to produce a "reform party" united around a particular set of reforms, but a broad-based movement committed to reform and accountability in general.

Obviously that means that different choices of Taoiseach might appeal to different members of the "mandate", but as long as they're free to change their minds afterwards - hence the "no deal, no entry to government" part of the pledge - that's not actually that important. The idea is that they're the yeast in the lump, rather than a different bit of lump.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Laminations · 28-03-2012 6:02pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

Yes - it's intentional, though, that there not be required to be a consensus on exactly what constitutes the necessary reform, because the idea isn't to produce a "reform party" united around a particular set of reforms, but a broad-based movement committed to reform and accountability in general.

Laudable but too vague for me to support. Without concensus views there would be endless infighting, ideological battles and total indecision.

FG already campaigned under the banner of large scale reform and have been disappointingly slow to deliver.

KyussBishop · 28-03-2012 6:04pm

From my point of view, it's far too easy for any startup party like that to be co-opted or coerced by another existing party, and finding enough credible/reputable people, who can't be bought out in one way or another, may be quite difficult.

I think a bigger picture issue that needs to be addressed (partly mentioned by Laminations), is the populous being able to hold government properly accountable, no matter who is in office; if any such reform movement gets into power, the very first reform it needs to make is to make functioning of government as transparent and open to the public as is humanly possible.

I mentioned it a bit in a thread on AH, but basically what it would mean is setting up a public repository of information (e.g. could just be a public website), and government is obliged to publish any and every document produced in government, minutes/recordings of every meeting, including with lobby groups, etc. etc..

Basically, just everything you can possibly think of would get published in this repository for public access, and when stuff needs to be kept confidential there must be paperwork published to justify that, and that itself must be made publicly accessible (without breaking confidentiality obviously), with an expiry of it's 'confidentiality' after 2-3 years or some such.

Every bit of documentation or information paid for by public money, in the public interest, or simply not deserving of classification would be publicly accessible (there may be practical limits, but this would still be the base principle).

My thoughts on this are admittedly at an early stage, so the details of how this would be implemented in a practical and efficient way need to be fleshed out, but this is a sure way of eliminating much corruption and making government far more accountable to the population, and helping make it more efficient.

There isn't really any excuse not to have things this way, now that the cost of publication of information is so small due to the Internet; the costs of running and maintaining this system, could be more than accounted for in reduced corruption/mismanagement and the ability of literally anyone to research, point out and highlight gross-inefficiency or corruption.

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 6:12pm

KyussBishop wrote: »

From my point of view, it's far too easy for any startup party like that to be co-opted or coerced by another existing party, and finding enough credible/reputable people, who can't be bought out in one way or another, may be quite difficult.

I think if you start now, you have a decent chance - and the existence of a large group helps keep people from being co-opted or coerced. I wouldn't really accept that there aren't, say, 50 credible and reputable people in Ireland who could be put forward for election.

KyussBishop wrote: »

I think a bigger picture issue that needs to be addressed (partly mentioned by Laminations), is the populous being able to hold government properly accountable, no matter who is in office; if any such reform movement gets into power, the very first reform it needs to make is to make functioning of government as transparent and open to the public as is humanly possible.

I mentioned it a bit in a thread on AH, but basically what it would mean is setting up a public repository of information (e.g. could just be a public website), and government is obliged to publish any and every document produced in government, minutes/recordings of every meeting, including with lobby groups, etc. etc..

Basically, just everything you can possibly think of would get published in this repository for public access, and when stuff needs to be kept confidential there must be paperwork published to justify that, and that itself must be made publicly accessible (without breaking confidentiality obviously), with an expiry of it's 'confidentiality' after 2-3 years or some such.

Every bit of documentation or information paid for by public money, in the public interest, or simply not deserving of classification would be publicly accessible (there may be practical limits, but this would still be the base principle).

My thoughts on this are admittedly at an early stage, so the details of how this would be implemented in a practical and efficient way need to be fleshed out, but this is a sure way of eliminating much corruption and making government far more accountable to the population, and helping make it more efficient.

There isn't really any excuse not to have things this way, now that the cost of publication of information is so small due to the Internet; the costs of running and maintaining this system, could be more than accounted for in reduced corruption/mismanagement and the ability of literally anyone to research, point out and highlight gross-inefficiency or corruption.

While I agree with that - and perhaps particularly as someone in IT with experience of public data and civil service internal work flows - such a repository, even had it 100% coverage, would not have prevented the kind of corruption Mahon found, nor would it reform the centralisation, unaccountability, and autocracy of the Irish system of government.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 6:17pm

Laminations wrote: »

Laudable but too vague for me to support. Without concensus views there would be endless infighting, ideological battles and total indecision.

Just the existence of a group of TDs not committed to either government or party-based opposition would go a long way towards being the main reform needed, even if they spent their time beating each other around the head. There is of course an obvious danger of winding up with people from the radical left/right or the sort of "anti-everything" camp, but I think you can do it in a way that excludes strong political opinions of that kind.

Laminations wrote: »

FG already campaigned under the banner of large scale reform and have been disappointingly slow to deliver.

That's kind of the point, though. They won't deliver. No political party will, as far as I can see, because a political party needs to feed itself and its supporters.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Gloomtastic! · 28-03-2012 6:21pm

Doesn't one negate the other?

1. no deals with the government - an 'expulsion' and 'name and shame' policy in respect of anyone breaking the pledge

2. agreeing to support as Taoiseach whoever makes the most credible commitment to reform.

Also, once they've got in, it could be very difficult to get them out. Look at that little Labour whippersnapper who took Brian Lenihans seat. :rolleyes:

Laminations · 28-03-2012 6:23pm

I just think a rag tag bunch of well intentioned people all with different ideas of reform and priorities on what to reform is doomed to failure. While the whip system isn't ideal, I think to achieve anything people need to compromise and drive in the same direction - that takes consensus. The failings of whip system leading to a rubber-stamp Dail can be addressed through reform of accountability where through regular updates, TDs need to explain their national decision making and voting behaviour to those who elected them.

KyussBishop · 28-03-2012 6:32pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

I think if you start now, you have a decent chance - and the existence of a large group helps keep people from being co-opted or coerced. I wouldn't really accept that there aren't, say, 50 credible and reputable people in Ireland who could be put forward for election.

I suppose yes; I'm skeptical though, I'm not sure there'd be that level of interest or support.

Scofflaw wrote: »

While I agree with that - and perhaps particularly as someone in IT with experience of public data and civil service internal work flows - such a repository, even had it 100% coverage, would not have prevented the kind of corruption Mahon found, nor would it reform the centralisation, unaccountability, and autocracy of the Irish system of government.

True, it won't prevent all corruption, particular where the people involved are smart enough to keep things managed with cash, but it would shed a lot more light on lobby groups and ministerial contacts etc..

It's not reform enough on its own, but I think if implemented right, would make things a lot more accountable; it would do something to sort the current situation, where a Freedom of Information request could end up costing you thousands, for information that should be in public hands already.

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 6:32pm

Gloomtastic! wrote: »

Doesn't one negate the other?

1. no deals with the government - an 'expulsion' and 'name and shame' policy in respect of anyone breaking the pledge

2. agreeing to support as Taoiseach whoever makes the most credible commitment to reform.

They're somewhat different - a "deal with the government" is an agreement between one of the major parties and the "independent" TD to support them in votes, and to vote for the party boss as Taoiseach in return for constituency roads or whatever. In other words, the major party pays, and the independent delivers their vote. Voting for someone as Taoiseach with the proviso that such a vote is conditional on reform progress and accountability is not a 'deal' as such.

Gloomtastic! wrote: »

Also, once they've got in, it could be very difficult to get them out. Look at that little Labour whippersnapper who took Brian Lenihans seat. :rolleyes:

Sure, you can't. But you can only do that once.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw · 28-03-2012 6:40pm

Laminations wrote: »

I just think a rag tag bunch of well intentioned people all with different ideas of reform and priorities on what to reform is doomed to failure. While the whip system isn't ideal, I think to achieve anything people need to compromise and drive in the same direction - that takes consensus.

Something which I think would be obvious to those involved. I agree that if it's too vague it's not going to achieve as much, but a group of TDs with commitment to holding the government to account is a sufficient reform in itself.

Laminations wrote: »

The failings of whip system leading to a rubber-stamp Dail can be addressed through reform of accountability where through regular updates, TDs need to explain their national decision making and voting behaviour to those who elected them.

First you need to get such a system in place, and make it binding, and make it meaningful, as opposed to just an exercise in apologetics for voting the party line.

After all, from that perspective, people have the opportunity at every election to dismiss their TD - but TDs don't bother to explain how they voted during their term, which leads to the possibility that it's not actually important to their voters.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Eliot Rosewater · 28-03-2012 8:47pm

I think it's a potentially great idea. The 1916 anniversary would make for a perfect publicity ploy. If one could tie the ideals of the campaign into the Rising it would make them very difficult to challenge.

I like the idea of a contract with financial penalties for breaking it. It has been amply demonstrated time and time again that legislators are not afraid of being held accountable by the electorate, and so another incentive is clearly required.

Scofflaw, what would your position be on actually being involved? I understand you're in demanding full-time employment. Would you be willing to put that on hold (potentially for years) to stand for election, should such a campaign as this materialize? That's only a half personal question, mind -- you're a model of an intelligent person of the kind one would want in this campaign, so your ability to be involved (or not) might be an indicator of whether this kind of campaign could get the kind of people on board needed to make it work.

Dannyboy83 · 28-03-2012 10:18pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

It would be possible, I think, to give the Reform Pledge the legal status of a contract, with penalties for breach of contract, most likely financial. That gives signing up to it something of a more serious character than just a verbal commitment.

I'm not sure how legal it is (I had assumed this type of contract was unenforceable given what we've seen with Roddy Molloy et al.), but assuming it is legal and enforceable, I think you are onto a guaranteed winner. An excellent idea imo.

2016: A Reform Mandate?

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