International Protection Bill 2026: Committee Stage Dail Éireann — 2026-02-18 ============================================================ Matt Carthy (SF), Cavan-Monaghan It is actually farcical when you think about it. The Minister has dismissed all our criticisms about the rushed nature of this, the lack of scrutiny of this legislation and the absolute fallacy of signing up to an EU asylum migration pact. Regardless of the merits of signing up, the whole purpose of Protocol 21 is actually a benefit Ireland had whereby we can sign up and opt in at any stage. If we decide not to opt in, we could opt in at a later stage, but no. Because Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael had to be shown to be doing something on migration, it was a case of signing ourselves up and tying ourselves into a deadline of June 2026. Despite the fact that this legislation has been brought forward by the Department of justice with a senior Minister who, if I may say so, is an eminent barrister, they cannot give us a definition of legal counselling, not at pre-legislative scrutiny, not on Second Stage of the legislation, not on Committee Stage, and now the Minister is saying it will not even be on Report Stage. It will not be defined until it gets to the Seanad. Will it be on Committee Stage? We know where the Seanad amendments come and what happens with them. They are brought in here for an hour's debate and all the rest of it. This is despite the fact that we have been told this. I am not a legal expert and I have never pretended to be but I am the Chair of the Oireachtas justice committee. Virtually every single person who appeared before us told us that one of the big issues they have with this legislation is that the term "legal counselling" is not defined. The Minister corrected himself at the very last moment in acknowledging that my amendment indicates "from a practising solicitor or barrister" but very clearly states "or a person employed by the Legal Aid Board who is authorised to provide legal advice or representation”. I did that knowing of the pressures of the Legal Aid Board, which the Minister has also acknowledged. I do not know if he has had time to look back or get a report on the hearing yesterday, which some of his officials attended. Other Members who are present were also there and they might also attest to this. I am really concerned about the future of civil legal aid in this State. I have raised concerns previously in the context of domestic violence victims and their ability to access the courts and access justice, and to secure barring orders. There is the potential that this situation could get even worse. I believe that a report was provided to the Minister about this last year. It was published last summer. We are ten months on, I think, from its publication and nothing has happened. The Minister has a minority and a majority report. Either would be better than the situation we are in here. The provision is there. Considering the timeframe and the lack of clarity the Minister has provided, it is only fair that the Dáil set this out clearly at this point. Adopt this amendment now and amend it later so that at least we will be in a better position than we are currently, when the term "legal counselling" is not defined at all in the legislation. We would be better off making this amendment. I would be only too willing to accept a further amendment, if it provided the clarity and assurance required. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-18/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:39+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-18