FG dismisses FF policy on reform as a 'cut-and-paste job'

POLITICAL REFORM:FINE GAEL has derided Fianna Fáil's political reform policy as a "cut-and-paste job" after many proposals in a document circulated by businessman Dermot Desmond were also contained in the party's manifesto.

Phil Hogan, Fine Gael's director of elections, claimed Fianna Fáil had no views of its own on political reform, when asked yesterday to respond to Mr Desmond's proposals outlined in The Irish Timesat the weekend.

“I think that Mr Desmond has indicated that this was a draft document he was working on with a group of people for the purposes of giving some views on political reform and how we can change the political system. Interestingly enough, Fianna Fáil decided to implement a lot of the proposals that were in that document because they had no views of their own,” Mr Hogan said.

He added: “Micheál Martin came out 10 days before the election and said that he wanted to see a directly elected Seanad and then he switched tack immediately when he got access to a document that seemed to be quite similar to Mr Desmond’s.”

Mr Hogan described some of the proposals in Mr Desmond’s document, circulated on February 1st, as “very interesting”. Fianna Fáil’s manifesto was launched on February 7th, he noted.

Fianna Fáil spokeswoman on political reform Averil Power criticised the constitutional changes proposed by Fine Gael yesterday. She criticised Fine Gael’s “intention to keep government positions limited to professional Dáil politicians alone”.

She added: “Fianna Fáil has published the most comprehensive proposals on political reform ever put forward by any party. Our plans would fundamentally overhaul how the political system works and rebuild public confidence in democratic institutions.”

Responding to the criticisms, Fine Gael justice spokesman Alan Shatter said Fianna Fáil had no right to criticise anyone’s plans for political reform “until they come up with some credible proposals of their own”. Fianna Fail’s record on political reform spoke for itself and party leader Micheál Martin’s personal record on the matter was “equally poor”, Mr Shatter said.

“As far as I can see, his reform plans are simply a cut-and-paste job,” he said.