The Referendum Commission has today responded to a request from Mr Richard Humphreys of One House, a group campaigning in the Seanad Referendum campaign, that it make clear that the figures supplied by the Houses of the Oireachtas to us in relation to the costs of running the Seanad related only to the costs to the Houses.
The Commission is expressing no view on whether or not there are other costs associated with the Seanad. We have no information on this. Below is the text of the Commission’s response.
Dear Mr Humphreys,
The Chairperson of the Referendum Commission, Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne, has asked me to thank you for your email of 2 October and to reply on her behalf. In response to a number of requests from the public and from the media in relation to the costs of the Seanad, the Commission wrote to the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission on 11 September 2013 and asked it to publish any information it had on its website. The Referendum Commission was aware from a report of the proceedings of Public Accounts Committee in January 2012 that the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission had some of this information.
The Houses of the Oireachtas Commission replied on 18 September and informed the Referendum Commission that the total annual running costs of Seanad Éireann had been estimated in the region of €20m per annum and that this was based on the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission outturn for 2012. The Referendum Commission decided to publish this correspondence on its website and also decided to make no further comment on the matter.
While it may be that there are costs to the Exchequer which are met from other sources, the Referendum Commission does not have information on any such costs and it would not be appropriate for the Commission to comment on this.
Yours sincerely,
David Waddell
Secretary
Referendum Commission
The Commission’s original statement on this matter which includes links to the correspondence with the Houses of the Oireachtas can be viewed here http://referendum2013.ie/referendum-commission-writes-to-houses-of-the-oireachtas-commission-on-seanad-costs/
