Higgins accused of rushing culture Bill

OPPOSITION deputies criticised proposals in the Cultural Institutions Bill which, they said, would enable the Government to control management boards.

Fianna Fail spokeswoman on arts, culture and heritage, Ms Sile de Valera, said the Minister seemed keen to get the Bill through quickly.

"I wonder is it because the Minister wants to appoint these new boards for the National Library and National Museum before he leaves office? This Bill offers him considerable opportunities for political patronage."

Under the Bill, she said, groups who had been running the library and museum, and bodies such as the RDS and the Royal Irish Academy, would lose control.

"While I accept that there is a need for updating the structures associated with our national institutions, enacting procedural changes without putting resources in place is a con. Fancy board structures will not disguise the lack of resources which the National Library, in particular, suffers from.

The library was at breaking point. Even the strategic plan prepared in 1992 had been shelved. Resources were so scarce that it had to close two mornings a week to enable night openings to continue.

Ms Mairin Quill, Progressive Democrats spokeswoman on arts and culture, said "like some remnant of the failed Soviet Union, the Labour Party is setting about centralising all power at Government level. Above all, they concentrate power in ministerial hands."

Under the Bill, the Minister would make all appointments to the boards of the National Library and Museum. Bodies such as the RDS, the Royal Irish Academy, the Royal Hibernian Academy, the Local Authority Curators Group and local historical and archaeological societies would be required to submit lists of names to the Minister for consideration. The Minister would not be obliged to select from these lists.

"I object to this provision," she said. "We ought to be lessening political control and authority, not increasing it."

The Bill would also increase the bureaucracy surrounding the issue of export licences by extending it to household goods. That was a gross interference with the right to have and sell private property.

The Bill was introduced by the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Mr Higgins, who said it provided a new legal framework for the operations of the National Museum and Library and a range of other measures to facilitate the development of cultural institutions and the protection of Ireland's moveable heritage.

In regard to appointments, he said the minister of the day was accountable to the Dail and represented the public. He believed the minister was in the best position to choose appointees. "This is the furthest possible position from a policy of exclusion, a philosophical approach underlining that elitism does not and will not inform any part of the thinking behind this Bill."

The second stage was passed and the Bill was referred to a Daily committee.