Criminal Law, Civil Law and Defence (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2026: Committee Stage (Resumed) Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-25 ============================================================ Jim O'Callaghan (FF), Dublin Bay South I thank Senator Harmon for the amendments and at the outset I acknowledge her role in ensuring this provision is within this miscellaneous provisions Bill. The reason for that is because last year, Senator Harmon introduced legislation in this House seeking to outlaw sex for rent. At the time I agreed with it and said I would try to bring it forward, which is what I am doing in section 45. The real advantage of a miscellaneous provisions Bill is that you can get provisions enacted and onto the Statute Book very promptly. Had I decided just to agree with Senator Harmon and say we would go down the route of introducing legislation to outlaw sex for rent, I would say we would not have it done by now. We would have to go through a long, detailed process and that is natural because there is a huge amount of work in the Department of justice. Officials work extremely hard and diligently but there obviously is prioritisation when it comes to legislation. That is why I wanted to prioritise this and the best way to prioritise it was by including it within the miscellaneous provisions Bill. I thank Senator Harmon for her role in catalysing the introduction of this legislation, and hopefully its enactment. The Senator is correct in identifying, as she did last year, that the reason we need this provision is because of this pretty hideous and reprehensible activity that is ongoing. I know certainly that when it comes to the beginning of the college year in September, we generally hear some further accounts in respect to this. As well as commending Senator Harmon, I should commend the journalists who have identified this and who brought it to the attention of policymakers and legislators such as ourselves. It is exploitative behaviour. We need to stamp it out and we need to ensure it is not recognised as being in any way acceptable behaviour. Criminalisation of this behaviour is also a programme for Government commitment. It is also in line with the zero-tolerance strategy and the line the Government has in respect of our approach to domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. Notwithstanding that it is something we all recognise needs to be made a criminal offence, it is complicated from a legislative perspective. This is why we had extensive engagement with the Office of the Attorney General in respect of the provisions. It required also getting the assistance of senior counsel with experience of prosecuting sexual offences. Officials in the Department of housing also contributed to the process. The legislative provisions we are including are novel insofar as they represent a potentially significant inroad into the private sphere of interpersonal relations. Great care has been taken to ensure that they are clear, precise and limited in scope. This is necessary in order to ensure that the provisions are workable, constitutionally sound and prosecutable and that they will not create any unintended consequences. I am confident that moving to criminalise this predatory behaviour sends a strong message that such behaviour is not acceptable and that we as a society will not tolerate it. I want to assure Senators that I will keep this area under review to ensure that the legislation is working as it should, including expanding it in due course if deemed necessary. In terms of the amendments put forward by Senator Harmon, where there is a reference on three occasions to "in lieu of payment" the Senator wants to include “in lieu of, or in exchange for a reduction in, payment”. The Office of the Attorney General has asked me to be cautious about this. The reason for that is when a person is asking somebody for sex in lieu of rent it is clear what is happening. The inclusion of "In lieu of a reduction in rent" could lead to circumstances where there may be a relationship ongoing between a landlord and a tenant. Are we going to then start saying that if there is a small reduction in rent because of the relationship that had consensually developed between them, in some respects could that retrospectively be identified as having been a criminal offence? It is an issue of concern. It is a novel piece of legislation and I would just say to Senator Harmon that I am not going to accept the amendments because of their breadth. I know they may appear logical in terms of what the Senator is trying to outlaw but given the interaction or interference it will have in certain relationships and what could be regarded as a criminal act, namely, reducing slightly rent by a certain amount because of a relationship, I am not going to accept the amendments. I have gone through the process of having the new section 45A vigorously examined by the Office of the Attorney General and by officials in my own Department who were very satisfied that it is constitutionally sound and will stand up to any scrutiny. I do not want to start interfering with it at this stage. In respect of other matters, we will keep it under review. Again, I want to commend Senator Harmon on her role in bringing forward this legislative provision. --- 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/seanad/2026-06-25/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:07+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-06-25