The Gazette 1993

VOL. 87 NO. 2

JULY/AUGUST 1993

V I E W P O I INT

Against the Guillotine

importance of that particular process.

commencing at the beginning of June, including the controversial tax amnesty legislation, and the Matrimonial Home Bill. Instant legislation is no panacea for the problems of our society. Flawed legislation benefits nobody except those whose activities it is intended to curb. The failure of an Act of the Oireachtas to effect its intended policy because it ! contains ill-considered provisions, which I are later proved to be flawed, may only ! exacerbate the original problem it was intended to solve. Individual parliamentarians, conscious of their duties to legislate effectively should desist from rushing through legislation. Good legislators do not simply count the number of Bills which have been passed. They should be satisfied only with legislation which has been passed after thorough parliamentary scrutiny. Experience has shown that rushed legislation invariably makes bad law. •

Recent newspaper comment indicated that the managers of the Government's legislative programme were pleased at the volume of legislation which had been processed in the weeks leading up to the adjournment of the Dail for the summer recess. Professional lawyers are as familiar as any other group with working to tight deadlines and thus appreciate that work done in such circumstances is not always impeccable. The imposition of guillo- tines on debates on proposed legislation, which is not of its nature urgent, is an abuse of our parliamentary procedure. Under that procedure the Committee Stage is devoted to a line-by-line examination of the detailed provisions of Bills with a view to ensuring that they will be effective in carrying out the intended policies behind them. The fact that ministerial amendments are often put down at Committee Stage shows the

Montesquieu, the great advocate of the constitutional separation of powers, argued that when the executive and legislative functions were in the same hands then liberty was lost. It may be an exaggeration to say that our liberty is being lost through the imposition of guillotines on debates on Bills, but it is hard to construe it as other than the executive imposing its will on the legislature. The process by which legislation is pre- pared in this country does not lend itself to participation by those outside Govern- ment administration. It frequently happens that the first indication that persons who will be affected by proposed legislation have of the precise I proposals is on the publication of the Bill. In all, a total of sixteen Bills were introduced during the six week period

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