The Labour leader Eamon Gilmore said his party would reduce the number of ministers of State from 20 to 15 if in government.
At the opening of the party’s national conference in Mullingar tonight Mr Gilmore said he would also reduce the number of Oireachtas committees to one per department.
More than 1,000 delegates heard Mr Gilmore say the country was ready for a Labour-led government.
“This Government has been in power for 12 years. They were the ones who got us into this mess. People simply don’t trust them to get us out.”
He called for the cosy link between big business and political parties to be smash by reducing the cap on donations from the current €6,500 to €2,500, and by making cumulative contributions of over €1,500 declarable.
Payments to individual candidates should be cut from €2,500 to €1,000, he added.
“Those limits should also apply to referendum campaigns,” he continued.
In a veiled reference to Libertas boss Declan Ganley’s role in influencing the Lisbon Treaty vote, he added: “No one individual should be able to use his or her personal wealth to influence the result, and to decide the content of our Constitution.”
Mr Gilmore also called for businesspeople to be appointed to state boards on merit only.
In a forthcoming Dáil Bill on corporate governance, Labour will call for limits to the number of boards an executive can sit on.
“The potential for conflicts of interest is too great if the corporate world is allowed to act as a cosy club for the select few,” he added.
Labour will also introduce a ‘sunset clause’ on all quangos so that they have a specific period of time to justify their existence.