Mr. Gogarty: I am speaking on
behalf of the Green Party environment spokesperson, Deputy Cuffe, who cannot
be here tonight. The Green Party wholeheartedly supports the abolition
of the dual mandate. Indeed, we are the only party where all the newly
elected councillors who became TDs resigned their seats within a short period
of time. That is something from which other parties might learn something. Both
Deputies Trevor Sargent and John Gormley were re-elected without having
to stand as councillors. Just to clarify for the Minister, there has been
a swap between the Labour Party, the Green Party, the Independents and Sinn
Féin.
As I mentioned, both of those TDs were successfully re-elected without having
been councillors as indeed have a number of Fianna Fáil Ministers. A
person does not have to be a councillor to run for election but it seems
that many of the Deputies in the House are scared out of their wits that
if they lose the so-called local touch someone else will come and usurp
their seat.
Mr. Ring: The Deputy is the hypocrite who was giving
up the wages. I checked last week and the Deputy gave up nothing. I
hate hypocrites.
Mr. Gogarty: Deputy Ring is the hypocrite who is hiding
behind constitutionality because he is scared out of his backside. That
is the truth.
Mr. Ring: I hate listening to hypocrites.
Acting Chairman: I ask Deputy Ring to allow the Deputy
continue.
Mr. Gogarty: I enjoy a bit of banter but we have only
a few minutes left. In the minute and 15 seconds I have left I ask the
Minister to follow up the abolition of the dual mandate with the introduction
of single transferable voting in single seat constituencies with a top
up list. Certainly that would go some way towards reassuring some
of the more scared Deputies such as Deputy Ring.
Mr. Ring: We will see how Deputy Gogarty does next time.
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