The Oireachtas is the official appellation of our national legislature as identified in the Constitution. According to Article 15.2, it is comprised of the President and two legislative houses, formally named the Dáil Éireann (House of Representatives) and the Seanad Éireann (Senate). This terminology aiming to describe a bicameral parliament was intentionally derived from American political terminology. In 1937, the hope was to convey the Irish State’s republican essence, despite remaining a Commonwealth member until 1949.
The Irish Free State establishment in 1922 nurtured a culture within the Dáil Éireann of strictly enforcing party whip on TDs. Due to the slender Dáil majorities, there was significant pressure on solo TDs not to defect and vote counter to their respective parties. However, there are few historical deviations from this stipulated rule. For instance, in 1972, Liam Cosgrave went against his party to support the Offences Against the State Bill, and Micheál Martin pragmatically allowed his party an open vote on the abortion issue.
There is a prevailing notion that our current party whip system is too stringent, and politicians ought to vote according to their convictions. However, as Noel Whelan noted in 2018, Leo Varadkar once dismissed the concept of a free vote on personal belief matters as “hogwash” back in 2013, with his party’s whip cautioning about the potential risk of opening the flood gates on open votes.
This is why it was peculiar when, during a meeting in the Taoiseach’s office to review Seanad Reform Bill’s advancement in early 2019, Varadkar implied that he would not back the Bill but would permit an open vote in the Dáil if the Bill was presented there. This approach was deemed by many as a cynical assassination to any potential revision and blatantly contradicted his previous statements regarding the Seanad.
In the German political system, there is an understood adherence to party line on trivial subjects. However, members of the Bundestag cannot be punished for choosing to vote in line with their conscience. According to Article 38 of their Basic Law, Bundestag members are deemed to be the “representatives of the entire people, not obliged to follow orders or directives, and solely answerable to their conscience”.
There is a distinct ‘conscience clause’ within the Progressive Democrats guidelines for TDs and Senators, which has been exercised at least once. Nonetheless, the party whip in Ireland operates under the strictest framework among contemporary liberal democracies. A conscious defiance of the whip, even on matters concerning conscience, has led to, and is usually followed by, the loss of a representative’s parliamentary party affiliation and parliamentary committee chairmanship, along with nearly every right to partake in debates with time constraints, except mere residual rights, or perhaps suspension or deselection.
Despite the imperfections of the British and American systems, they don’t tremble at the prospect of governments suffering defeats as a result of dissenting supporters within their parties.
Concerning the Dáil, there is hardly any justification for implementing such a stringent whip system in the Seanad. The Seanad doesn’t have the power to reject a budgetary commitment. It does have the abilities to propose and pass Bills and amend Dáil Bills, but if the Dáil disagrees with these amendments, it can override the Seanad after 90 days and consider the Bill passed by both Houses. When such scenario arises, there is a hypothetical right for half of the Seanad and one-third of the Dáil to request the President to subject the Bill to a public referendum (a power that is yet to be used). However, a Bill can only be prevented from becoming law if a majority of voters, comprising at least one-third of the total electorate, disapprove it.
Therefore, there’s barely any reason for the Dáil to subjugate the Seanad unceasingly — whether by the unacceptable procedure of Seanad election or by enforcing a tight whip system in the Seanad.
Throughout the tenure of the “confidence and supply” government led by Fine Gael from 2016 to 2020, there was no strict party-line voting in the Seanad. Remarkably, the Occupied Territories Bill passed despite government opposition, thanks to non-government parties and independent Seanad members. It is noteworthy that not only there was no disaster, but the Seanad also acted with responsibility and the Dáil’s minority Fine Gael administration functioned fairly satisfactorily.
Why must an Irish legislator who has been chosen by the democratic process risk their entire profession by adhering to their principles?
The imminent general election provides an open door for a newly chosen group of cooperating independents to demand that any administration elected with their involvement and endorsement should lessen the rigid control of the party whip in the Oireachtas Houses. This should be to at least an equivalent degree as seen in other European democracies without any catastrophic effects. Such an alteration would bolster public belief in our democracy, rather than undercut it.