We need a system that elects some people who understand economic realities, writes GARRET FITZGERALD
IT IS now clear to everyone that our present political system is dysfunctional. For, from the late 1990s onwards, it gave us a government none of whose members seem to have been able to grasp the implications of the crucial decision they had just taken to join the euro zone.
The simple fact which they failed to understand is that membership of a monetary union – within which devaluation is impossible – leaves no room for a failure to control the growth of public spending.
In our case a spending splurge in the earlier part of this decade led to a rise in prices and wages more than twice as great as the rate of inflation in other euro zone states. As a result, well before we faced the housing bubble or the banking debacle, this fundamental policy error had already undermined our international competitiveness, cutting our share of global exports by one-fifth.
A second key point is that only people with both relevant experience and exceptional economic competence ought to be appointed to the key positions of governor of the Central Bank and financial regulator.
What we now urgently need is an electoral system that will make it possible to have in government some people with a firm grasp of economic realities, who might be prepared to look to the long-term economic welfare of our people and be capable of resisting short-term and localist pressures.
The system that could best move us in that direction would be a variant of the German electoral system. The Germans believe in single-seat constituencies, the introduction of which here would avoid TDs being forced by competition from colleagues in the same party to devote most of their time to constituency work rather than to their legislative role.
But the Germans also share our commitment to the principle that parliamentary representation should reflect the views of the electorate.
Now, we know from the British case that left to itself a single-seat election system produces markedly unproportional parliaments. So the achievement of the dual objective of single-seat constituencies and proportionality requires that some extra members be elected simultaneously, preferably from a national list, from which additions would be made to the parliamentary strength of parties in such a way as to make its representation in parliament proportional to the popular vote.
A change to such a system – proposed to but rejected by the Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution a decade ago – has failed to command support from TDs despite the fact that for most of them it would reduce their vulnerability to electoral defeat. Of course Labour, which hitherto has had only one TD in any constituency, has had no reason to support such a reform, but now, with the prospect of two Labour TDs being elected in a dozen constituencies, that party also has a potential interest in such a reform which would save it from the kind of constituency infighting that has so often racked Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.
But the most significant factor favouring such a reform today may lie with public opinion – disillusionment with our existing political system is now almost universal. This could favour a switch away from support for the present electoral system – dominated by local factors – to one that would yield a more effective nationally-centred parliament.
Let me list some of the potential benefits of a switch to such an additional-member electoral system.
First, it is not generally realised that in our present multi-seat system two-thirds of the defeats of Fianna Fáil TDs over the past half-century have been by party colleagues.
And Fine Gael TDs have suffered a similar but lesser rate of attrition at the hands of party colleagues.
This system has inevitably led TDs to maximise their concentration on constituency work at the expense of their primary role as legislators.
Second, because new single-member constituencies would on average be about one-third of the size of the existing multi-member ones, members of the public in these smaller constituencies would have much readier access to their TDs. Yet at the same time TDs would have a much smaller overall volume of constituency work in the smaller constituencies.
Third, with such a system it would be possible to address public demand for a smaller Dáil. Given the obvious difficulty we currently have in securing from a 166-seat Dáil a sufficient number of competent Ministers, a reduction in the size of that House would be hazardous. But with a new electoral system along the lines just suggested, offering a prospect of a greater number of well-qualified TDs, a somewhat smaller Dáil might be safely contemplated.
Fourth, the Dáil would benefit from having some TDs who would not be prisoners of local interests, but who could speak and act in the general national interest.
Finally, and in national terms most important of all, the additional-member system would enable political parties to improve the quality of their Dáil representation by placing people with valuable expertise high on their supplementary lists.
There have, I know, been suggestions that a party in government might achieve this objective, at least partially, by using taoiseach’s nominations to the Seanad to bring two such people into government, as is permitted by the Constitution. I did that in 1981 in the case of Jim Dooge, whom I wanted to have as minister for foreign affairs – the first time this had been done in the second half of the 20th century.
I soon found out why my predecessors in office had been reluctant to use this route towards strengthening the quality of their governments. For I was formally told that by looking outside Dáil membership for my foreign minister, I had insulted, and lost the confidence of the entire Fine Gael Dáil party.