Mental Health Bill 2024: Report and Final Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2026-04-16
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Victor Boyhan (IND), Agricultural Panel

At the outset, because there was a lot of work done in the past few days, I particularly thank the Bills Office. I only learned yesterday - every day is a learning day - that it is the task of the Bills Office to do these listings and it is completely separate from the Minister's office. There is no influence whatsoever between the two departments and that gives us confidence. I did not doubt that, but it is nice to learn that because I thought it was the Seanad Office that was making these decisions. I learnt something new. Therefore, I acknowledge the important work of the Bills Office and its staff and the enormous pressure they are under in keeping all the legislation going across both Houses to come up with this list. I also acknowledge that they gave us a narrative on each of these too, which I thought was really interesting. I also acknowledge that the Minister gave us a narrative there a day or two ago. The comparison was similar. There is cross-pollination and co-ordination. That is to be expected, given the complexity and understanding of the issues involved.
I do not like using the phrase "a clean-up act" but, effectively, it is cleaning up a few commas and bits and pieces here. Personally, I take it in good faith. In the interest of moving things along because we have some very important amendments yet to be considered, I am happy to support that set of proposals by the Minister of State.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-04-16/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:49+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-16