Criminal Law, Civil Law and Defence (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2026: Report and Final Stages Seanad Éireann — 2026-07-02 ============================================================ Jim O'Callaghan (FF), Dublin Bay South Amendments Nos. 2 and 36 to 39, inclusive, are amendments relating to character evidence which were put forward by Deputy Carthy on Committee Stage in the Dáil and which I said I would consider. I did not accept them on Committee Stage. I considered them and I accepted them on Report Stage. What happened on Report Stage is we have inserted, through Deputy Carthy's amendment, a new section into the Criminal Justice Act 1993 to provide that where a person is convicted of an indictable offence, character evidence for sentencing purposes must be given on oath or by affidavit. That amendment was included as section 23 of the Bill. The purpose of amendments Nos. 36 to 38, inclusive, is to address a number of drafting and consequential matters identified arising from section 23. Amendment No. 36 deletes the existing section 23, with amendment No. 38 inserting in its place a new stand-alone provision of the Bill, which is substantively the same, but is more precisely drafted and contains a transitional provision. As it applies to all indictable offences, amendment No. 38 has the effect of superseding Chapter 3 of Part 2 of the sexual offences Act, which provides that character evidence for sentencing in indictable sexual offences shall be on oath or by affidavit. Amendment No. 37 therefore repeals that provision in order to prevent duplication on the Statute Book and to avoid confusion in practice. I will now turn to the amendment of the public order Act. Amendment No. 39 inserts a new part into the Bill to amend the 1994 Act in order to address a specific public order issue, which is the deliberate use of face coverings for intimidatory purposes in public places, and particularly at protests. I stress that this is not a ban on face coverings or a ban on wearing face coverings at protests, and neither does it create a general power for members of An Garda to require a person wearing a face covering in public to remove it. Instead, it is a limited addition to the public order framework, which may be exercised only in specific circumstances and with statutory safeguards. The amendment provides that where a member of An Garda suspects, with reasonable cause, that a person is acting in circumstances that give rise to a reasonable apprehension for public safety or the maintenance of public peace, and that the person is wearing a face covering with the intention of intimidating another person or in a manner likely to intimidate another person, the garda may direct that person to desist from that conduct, remove the face covering and leave the vicinity. Only where a person without lawful authority or reasonable excuse fails to comply with that lawful Garda direction does an offence arise. It is a very high statutory threshold. A garda must suspect that both statutory conditions are satisfied before any direction may be given. The requirement for reasonable cause is an established safeguard in criminal law, requiring objectively justifiable grounds that are capable of judicial scrutiny. The amendment deliberately does not confer statutory power on An Garda Síochána to forcibly remove a face covering. I concluded that a more appropriate and proportionate approach was to rely upon the established model of a lawful Garda direction, with an offence arising only where a person without lawful authority or reasonable excuse fails to comply. The 1994 Act already contains provisions under which gardaí may issue lawful directions in defined public order situations. This amendment follows that established legislative approach rather than creating a fundamentally new policing model. I fully recognise that many people wear face coverings for entirely legitimate reasons. They may do so for medical reasons, religious observance or cultural practice or simply as a matter of personal choice. I am also aware that at protests people may want to wear face coverings to hide their identity, if they did not want, for instance, their employer to know that they were at a particular protest. Nothing in this amendment changes that position. The mere wearing of a face covering does not in any way trigger the exercise of this power. It only arises when it is being worn for the purpose of seeking to intimidate another person. I also recognise the constitutional importance of the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. Those rights are fundamental and nothing in the amendment interferes with that. Obviously, those constitutional rights must be exercised in a manner which respects the rights of others and the maintenance of public order. Where a face covering has been worn as part of intimidating conduct, in circumstances that threaten public peace or public safety, An Garda should have a clear statutory power to intervene before matters escalate further. Sometimes even Members of the Oireachtas can find themselves being intimidated by people who are wearing face coverings. In such circumstances, we should not say that the law has no remedy against that intimidation. The remedy I am proposing is that the gardaí should be able to direct the person to remove the face covering. If they do not remove it, that is an offence. It gives no power to An Garda to start forcibly removing it. Amendment No. 2 amends the Long Title, consequential on these amendments. There are two amendments in this group, the first of which is Deputy Carthy's amendment that I was happy to accept. It will now mean that not just in the cases of serious sexual offences will character evidence have to be given on affidavit or in person; it will now apply to all indictable convictions. Second is the amendment to the public order legislation, which I believe is necessary. I want Senators to be aware that it is limited to the circumstances where a face covering is being worn for the purpose of intimidating others. --- 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/2026-07-02/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:09+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-07-02