In the programme for Government, there is a good provision for the facility to evaluate progress in a transparent and accountable fashion – this relates to progress on the programme for Government.

This section of the day is about Deputies asking when specific legislation will be brought forward by the Government in respect of specific issues. However, the time is coming fast when it will become a fairly redundant exercise, given that 140 Bills are languishing on Committee Stage in this House. To be fair, I know the Ceann Comhairle has taken an initiative in this regard but there are responsibilities on Government as well. The Government has produced but 23 items of legislation. Some of those are not comprehensive or earth-shattering in the sense that they are rather technical Bills. Clearly, there is room for Government to improve. Some of these Bills have been simply left there by the Government. I do not know why the Government has not engaged in the education field and so on. We are reading reports that some public servants are of the view that they are not pushing forward Bills because the Dáil might get at them. This is a parliamentary democracy. I respectfully suggest that people in the public service or elsewhere have to accept the reality of the Dáil as it is.

Thank you, Deputy.

I call on the Government to publish the legislation and engage with the Opposition on the issues to get the legislation it might want passed actually passed rather than have it waiting interminably.

Thank you, Deputy. Time is up.

As for some of the Bills on Committee Stage, there was an agreement that there would be a more practical approach to money Bills and money messages. The Government is holding back on that. The Government is not fulfilling its commitments in respect of money messages. The Coroners Bill is still with the Select Committee on Justice and Equality, for example, as well as other Bills. Deliberate acts by Government are preventing the advancement of some of the Bills currently languishing on Committee Stage. This requires action. The Government has to come to the table with some definitive action.

Thank you, Deputy. We have 20 Members offering. We will not be able to call them all unless we can be concise in our questions and answers.

We should get something very clear here, first of all. This is a very different working Dáil to previous Dáileanna because the Government does not control the full agenda here. One of the changes that we made was to give backbench Deputies the right to put forward opportunities for Private Members' Bills. That is an important facility in any democracy.

We always had that.

We had but, as Deputy Martin knows, few of them came through.

None of them came through.

We did not have a backed-up list of 140. In my time in here, few Private Members' Bills have passed – I could count fewer than a dozen in any particular year, although maybe I am wrong.

We now have 140 of these Bills backed up. It is easy for a Deputy to say an issue should be addressed and that he or she should get a Bill drafted on it. What happens is that the Minister responsible, especially in the area of justice, then has to take that Bill and amend it properly to deal with all of the issues that arise from it and that might not have been considered by the Deputy with the best intentions in the world.

It is called parliamentary democracy.

Some of the Bills that are being taken have to be amended extensively by the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel to the Government to make them into a Bill that is fit for purpose-----

They have not been amended at all. That is the problem. They are in committee.

-----and taking into account issues that might be far beyond the central issue.

They have not got to the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel to the Government.

For instance, we have-----

What about the Government's Bills?

Currently, there are perhaps 20 Bills before the Dáil. Some are on Report Stage while others are on Second Stage or Committee Stage. A similar situation arises in respect of the Seanad Order Paper. The Deputy is around a long time and knows that the Constitution is clear in respect of money messages. Article 17.2 states:

Dáil Éireann shall not pass any vote or resolution, and no law shall be enacted, for the appropriation of revenue or other public moneys unless the purpose of the appropriation shall have been recommended to Dáil Éireann by a message from the Government signed by the Taoiseach.

Yes.

We are waiting for those.

We are waiting for those.

If we are to have 140 Bills-----

Not 140, Taoiseach. I did not say 140.

The point is-----

Deputies, please.

Let me make my point.

There is some very low hanging fruit there, Taoiseach.

Let the Taoiseach answer.

Let me make the point. For instance, take the Coroner's Bill-----

The Taoiseach is abusing----

Clare Daly's one.

------which is currently being dealt with by Deputy Ó Caoláin. The charge involved is approximately €12 million. If that were to be allowed through, it is €12 million of the Vote for that particular Department. Taking ten Bills or whatever one wants out of the 140, the charge is then taken off the Vote that has gone through from the relevant Minister. We all learn lessons, do we not? Perhaps we should, as the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, made the point to me, leave aside €100 million for Private Member's Bills which could compete on priority for money messages that might be necessary to put those Bills through.

That is not the point. That is not the way it works and the Taoiseach knows it.

However, I am not in a position to accede to requests such as this one-----

Is the Taoiseach saying that there will be no money messages?

The Taoiseach is rowing back on what he committed.

-----which is that we should respond by having money messages signed by the Taoiseach in accordance with the Constitution, when we know the outcome.

All those Bills will be dead. Is that what the Taoiseach is saying? There is no point-----

It was a good thing that any Deputy would be able to put forward a Private Member's Bill, but perhaps we on all sides did not think it out clearly enough and ask what we meant by it. We cannot put through a Bill that is inadequate, inferior or will not work.

The Government does it often enough.

Therefore, while the thought or the intent might have been good, the Minister involved might have to amend the Bill extensively. If there is a money charge, it does not fall into line with the expenditure intentions and priorities of the Department.

What about the ones with no money charges? Absolute balderdash.

Perhaps that is an issue that we should discuss. In respect of the 140 Bills, I know that there is a discussion to be had through the Ceann Comhairle's chairmanship as to what the parties want as their priorities out of that 140.

It appears that the Business Committee will need to engage with the Taoiseach's Department to try to resolve those matters.