Senators line up for 'Late Late' special

SEANAD ÉIREANN moves from Leinster House to the studios at Donnybrook tonight for a special edition of RTÉ’s Late Late Show.

All 60 Senators have been invited to appear and, although some are out the country or otherwise indisposed, at least half the membership of the Upper House is expected to attend.

As of last evening, more than 20 Senators had accepted the invitation but this is likely to increase before the programme starts at 9.30pm.

“We’ll be tabling the motion: is the Senate past its sell-by date? Do we need two houses of the Oireachtas?” said executive producer Larry Masterson. “We’re looking forward to some energetic debate.”

Fianna Fáil’s Donie Cassidy and Trinity College Independent David Norris will make initial contributions and others scheduled to speak include Fine Gael’s Fidelma Healy Eames, Labour’s Alex White, Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty and Dan Boyle of the Greens.

The issue of Seanad reform as a means of reducing public expenditure has come to the fore since the start of the economic downturn.

Fine Gael called last week for 20 Senators, one-third of the membership, to be directly elected by the public, five from each of the European Parliament constituencies; these elections to take place every five years on the same date as local and European elections.

Fine Gael also proposed that all graduates would have the right to vote for the six university Senators instead of the present situation whereby three are elected by Trinity graduates and three by the National University of Ireland.

The Seanad would also be permitted to take presentations from the public on matters of national importance and to initiate constitutional referendums.

Average viewing figures for the Late Late Show have been 693,000 for the 2008/2009 season so far, compared with 627,000 in 2007/2008.