{"id":226503,"date":"2026-01-04T06:58:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T06:58:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/226503\/"},"modified":"2026-01-04T06:58:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T06:58:11","slug":"better-paid-tds-more-powerful-ministers-and-other-ideas-to-improve-ireland-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/226503\/","title":{"rendered":"Better-paid TDs, more powerful ministers \u2013 and other ideas to improve Ireland \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s four ideas that might improve our<\/a> politics<\/a> and public life. There might not be much prospect of them happening, but they are worth thinking about.<\/p>\n

Change the electoral system<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t have the worst electoral system, but it promotes localism, intraparty competition and short-termism, and incentivises TDs to concentrate on servicing their constituents, rather than thinking about the national interest. A bit of this is not much harm \u2013 but when it becomes the defining feature of political behaviour it is most definitely a problem.<\/p>\n

Irish politicians have become experts at managing this, which is why it is possible for national politicians to wail about the housing crisis<\/a> in the D\u00e1il<\/a> and then object on flimsy grounds to housing developments in their localities. Voters may be happy about this, but they shouldn\u2019t be. A different electoral system \u2013 a combination of constituencies and lists, perhaps \u2013 might help.<\/p>\n

Reduce the number of TDs and pay them better<\/p>\n

Unless there is a constitutional amendment to change the rules, the number of TDs is going to keep increasing. That will invariably breed public resentment. Why not reduce the number, pay them better, and give them more responsibility? One of the reasons that politicians are so obsessed with constituency work is that you need so few votes \u2013 by international standards \u2013 to get elected. Depending on the constituency, you could do it with 7,000. You can do it anywhere with 10,000. It\u2019s actually possible to meet that many people in five years \u2013 so that\u2019s what politicians try to do.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not the best way of spending their time. Less focus on constituency work would enable more time for work on policy, on committees and for thinking about how to solve the country\u2019s problems and prepare it for the future.<\/p>\n

[\u00a02025 in Irish politics: A messy D\u00e1il start, more housing woes and, finally, a new presidentOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

A while back I spoke to a barrister who became a judge a few years ago. The big difference, said m\u2019lud, was that there was now time to think more deeply. The email doesn\u2019t constantly ping. The phone rings a lot less. You can just sit and think about the law and what the correct decision in any case is. It would be good if our politicians could carve out even a little of that space.<\/p>\n

Of course, this requires a mindset change from voters. If they reward politicians who spend all their time on constituency work, then that\u2019s what politicians will do.<\/p>\n

Empower ministers<\/p>\n

There are strengths to having ordinary politicians head the departments of state. But it means that they are hugely reliant on the specialist advice of their officials and often don\u2019t have any real understanding of the areas for which they are responsible. This is okay in some departments, but not great in others. Specialist knowledge, in any walk of life, is an advantage. People often say doctors make bad minsters for health and that may be true, but experts in health systems \u2013 like Stephen Donnelly \u2013 can make good ones. Some countries separate the executive from the parliament and there is something to be said for it. But maybe a better way would be empower the ministers we have.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0A large hole is going to appear in Ireland\u2019s finances – and guess who will be paying?Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Talk to any politician who has served as a minister and they will all cite difficulties in mobilising the great machine of the State \u2013 and its permanent bureaucracy \u2013 to achieve the policy aims that have been endorsed by voters and negotiated as part of a programme for government. Allowing ministers to bring in their own team of senior officials \u2013 both from within and outside the Civil Service \u2013 would mean they are able to get a firmer grip more quickly on delivering policy objectives. This is how it works in the European Commission, where each commissioner can select their own \u201ccabinet\u201d of senior officials. It would also allow ministers to bring in more expertise from the private sector.<\/p>\n

Securing the co-operation of the existing Civil Service would still be crucial. But bringing in civil servants as well as outsiders would help with that. So would pre-election consultations between government departments and opposition parties to scope out how their manifestos might be implemented.<\/p>\n

Make fiscal rules binding on government<\/p>\n

Minister for Finance Simon Harris unveiled the latest medium-term fiscal framework before Christmas. A reasonable question would be: will the Government stick by the spending limits set out in it? And a reasonable answer to this would be: probably not.<\/p>\n

The previous government continued to flout its own expenditure rules after the Covid and cost-of-living pressures had passed. The Fiscal Council, among others, was very critical about this, though the politicians \u2013 understandably \u2013 pleaded that the public simply would not wear the sort of parsimony the economists advocated. There is something in that, too.<\/p>\n

This is a recurring dilemma of democratic politics \u2013 how to get politicians to do what\u2019s best for the longer term when it might be unpopular in the short term? The old Luxembourg warhorse Jean-Claude Juncker put it succinctly during the financial crisis. \u201cWe all know what we have to do,\u201d he said of the choices then facing EU governments. \u201cWe just don\u2019t know how to get elected afterwards.\u201d Always beware of politicians who tell you there are easy answers to difficult questions.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Fintan O\u2019Toole: Ireland has two economies, one bourgeois, one proletarian. Both are brokenOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

One possible way around this on fiscal issues is to make the rules binding through legislation, so that governments would not be able to break the rules without first repealing them by an Act of the Oireachtas.<\/p>\n

Before Christmas, the Fiscal Council warned that the Government would save just \u20ac1 out of every \u20ac7 collected in corporation tax next year. We should probably be doing three times that amount. Of course, because of pressure from voters, politicians find it hard to discipline themselves. This move would make it easier for them. And nothing is more important than maintaining sound public finances. Everything good that a government can do depends on that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s four ideas that might improve our politics and public life. There might not be much prospect of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":226504,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15049,61,60,43,12636,42555],"class_list":["post-226503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-dail-eireann","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-oireachtas","tag-pat-leahy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/226504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}