I support the proposal to amend the Constitution on cabinet confidentiality. The amendment will allow the absolute ban to be relaxed in two circumstances. The first is where a relaxation would be in the interests of the administration of justice by a court.

The second area of relaxation of the absolute ban would be where a tribunal has been set up to investigate a matter of public importance, and a court agrees it is in the public interest that the absolute confidentiality rule be relaxed in regard to a matter before that particular tribunal.

These provisions mean that a court decision is needed in both cases if the absolute confidentiality rule is to be relaxed.

I believe this is right. If cabinet confidentiality could be set aside too lightly, this would undermine the work of the government. It would be very difficult to get collective consensus decisions, because ministers would feel they would have to defend their positions "for the record". They would be worried about their political position if the discussions were subsequently disclosed.

This does not mean that the issues underlying a decision could not be publicly discussed in an informed way. The absolute confidentiality rule applies only to discussion at the cabinet table, not to memoranda prepared for cabinet discussion.

These preparatory memoranda set out all the issues being considered by a cabinet, and this will allow full information, for public discussion if necessary, even though the discussions at the cabinet table may not be disclosed publicly.

Cabinet confidentiality of this kind is normal across Europe.

The new regime that will come into being, if the referendum is passed, will be broadly similar to those applying across Europe.

It will allow informed discussion of the issues before cabinet without getting into what individual ministers at the table said before a decision was taken.

I believe the contention by some opponents of the proposal that the amendment will actually entrench cabinet confidentiality more deeply than before is not at all correct.

Confidentiality is already entrenched, in the most restrictive possible way, by the Supreme Court's interpretation in the case of the beef tribunal, of the existing constitutional article on collective responsibility of cabinet ministers.

Any setting aside of the strict confidentiality rule would, in the Supreme Court's view, cut across the existing constitutional article on collective responsibility. Therefore, any relaxation of this rule has to come about by a constitutional amendment that changes the meaning of the present constitutional wording.

I believe it would not be the right approach to pass legislation relaxing cabinet confidentiality in the speculative hope that the Supreme Court might take a different view, some other time, to the one they took on the beef tribunal. That approach would lack certainty, and could be a big time-waster.

But, even more relevantly, we need to relax strict cabinet confidentiality urgently. We cannot afford to wait for new legislation, or a new Supreme Court decision. We need action now to relax strict confidentiality so as to allow the recently appointed tribunals, if they deem it necessary, to find out what discussion led to particular cabinet decisions.

If the amendment were to be rejected, or if it were to be postponed in favour of legislation, it would be too late for these new tribunals. They would then be spancelled in the same way as the beef tribunal was. Nobody wants that.

These are the reasons why I will be voting Yes.

John Bruton TD is leader of Fine Gael

Series concluded