Seanad report: Joe O'Toole (Ind) made an unsuccessful attempt to get an emergency debate on the "crisis" at the Marino College of Education in Dublin.
He said that his request was based on specific information that he had come across. It had raised some legal issues for him. There was a whole legal fiasco about the operation of the board and members of it.
"I want to have looked at the role of Svengali-like figures on the legal committee of that board who pushed the college into taking a fiasco of a legal action which has cost them so much money that they can't go ahead and do their work."
There was also a need to discuss "the role of a person who said, 'You are sitting on 38 acres of prime land in north Dublin, get back to work', and then went and set up a meeting of the board in an office of Treasury Holdings".
Told by the Cathaoirleach Rory Kiely that it was sufficient formally to give notice of his motion, Mr O'Toole said he was elaborating because he wanted to press his case for the granting of a debate.
"I came across an e-mail to members of the board which says 'slowly, slowly, catchee monkey', sent by this man, Dermod Dwyer, which obviously makes it clear to me that there was a planned and structured programme of harassment, bullying and intimidation to force the resignation of a fantastic educationalist and leader".
Mr Kiely said it was not in order to mention individuals outside the House by name.
Mr O'Toole said they needed to look at the attitude that "they're in the way, take them out, is what he said". That was not good enough.
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The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform Michael McDowell said that it was his intention to have a Bill currently before the House amended to convert the Registry of Deeds and the Land Registry into a statutory body on the lines of the Courts Service. The new body would be known as the Property Registration Authority and would have a representative board, including representatives of conveyancing interests as well as consumer, staff and other relevant interests. The new structure would put the registries on a sound administrative footing and would underpin the modernisation process which was already well advanced in them.
Initiating the debate on the Registration of Deeds and Title Bill 2004, Mr McDowell said he was pleased to inform the House that the Law Reform Commission, assisted by Prof John Wylie and officials of the department, had greatly progressed the project to set out in one statute the land law of Ireland.
"We will publish the heads of that statute in the relatively near future. That, combined with the programme which is already under way for electronic registration of documents and electronic mapping of properties which are the subject of registration, will transform, within a short period, the law of property here for practitioners from what is currently a familiar but cluttered slum to a modern edifice worthy of a country that wants to do business in the real world".
David Norris (Ind) complained that the present Bill did not address the madness of the need for repetitive confirmation of title searches when property was changing hands. The point of this was to make money easily for firms of solicitors. It should be sufficient to have such searches completed just once and the files stacked in a central registry. He urged the Minister to act on his suggestion.
The Minister responded that Mr Norris had rightly raised the point of multiple searches. It was ridiculous that they could not be in some sense cumulative. This would be dealt with in the Bill, the heads of which would be published in July next. "I have no doubt that the point the senator is making is correct, that when a search is done it should be capable of being authenticated and that's the end of the matter."
He agreed with Senator Joanna Tuffy (Lab) and other members of the House that they should be going away from the deeds and searches regime towards a certified title in a land certificate. The new property registration authority would have to address this issue. It was not the end of the world if a particular line of legal business dried up, because there would always be other lines opening up for lawyers who were inventive enough to change their practices.