I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important legislation. I want to reference correspondence I have received from constituents regarding correspondence from the Irish Council for Civil Liberties on the legislation. It has raised the following three particular points. The scheme should be expanded to all survivors and the six-month threshold needs to be looked at; the legal waiver, criticised by the UN which has specifically asked for its removal, should be removed; and the compensation available should be i…

I have one specific question to which I hope the Minister will respond. I want a categorical commitment from the Minister that electricity supply to homes around this country will not be cut if there is a tightening of supply this winter. We have a perverse situation because of the fear that has been instilled in people. Older people are forking out €1,800 to buy back-up diesel generators in case their electricity supply is switched off. The Government and the CRU are causing this panic, particularly among older pe…

I refer to motion No. 152 on the Order Paper. I seek the Taoiseach's direct intervention in the humanitarian crisis facing eight families in Ballagh and Lisfelim in the area of south Roscommon. Along with six of my colleagues from across the country, I have tabled a motion seeking the establishment of a cross-departmental and cross-agency task force to address emergency climate adaptation measures to protect homes nationwide. I ask the Taoiseach, as the Head of Government, to establish a national task force to take…

The programme for Government committed to fast-tracking the national broadband plan because, thanks to Covid, there was a realisation at long last that delivering broadband to every home in Ireland has the potential to transform our economy, and nowhere more so than in rural Ireland. We witnessed a spike in local house prices as high-tech jobs relocated from the Dublin docks to rural townlands, with the knock-on potential to reduce the climate impact of transport in rural areas by reducing the need to commute long …

Sadly, the Minister still has not acknowledged that remote working has an impact on reducing our climate emissions. The national broadband plan will deliver fibre to rural areas and families, who will come off the existing fibre broadband services. That provides an opportunity to improve the quality of wireless broadband services to families who are further down the list in terms of deployment areas by reusing that equipment. I want to see the wireless equipment that is being taken out of some 30,000 homes over the…

I move amendment No. 2: In page 9, lines 4 to 6, to delete all words from and including “any” in line 4 down to and including “section” in line 6 and substitute “the nearest public office of the Garda Síochána to where they reside”. Before the clock starts, I wish to recognise retired Garda Sergeant John Hynes and his wife, Catherine, who are in the Public Gallery. John was probably one of the foremost members of An Garda Síochána in securing prosecutions against sex offenders across the west. In fact, 26 of the 28…

I am disappointed with the Minister's response regarding an issue which I believe is fundamental to this Bill. The Minister is looking at this issue from a particular perspective, but if we turn it on its head and look at it from the opposite perspective, rather than looking at this provision and how it facilitates sex offenders, it will be seen it is not limiting them to the local Garda station. What the Minister is saying to a convicted sex offender, who must be monitored and who poses a high risk in the communit…

The Minister's Department highlighted problems with this legislation 13 years ago. It has taken us this long to get this far. Is the Minister honestly telling me we are going to see amending legislation when there is a problem with what we are enacting now? We will not. The Minister is telling us the Garda is saying it is happy with what is in this Bill. I have been at this for 13 years and I can tell the Minister that gardaí throughout the country enforcing these measures now are saying that a coach-and-four is be…

I move amendment No. 4: In page 10, lines 16 and 17, to delete "any Garda Síochána station which is a divisional headquarters" and substitute "the nearest public office of the Garda Síochána to where they reside".

I move amendment No. 5: In page 10, lines 26 and 27, to delete "any Garda Síochána station which is a divisional headquarters" and substitute "the nearest public office of the Garda Síochána to where they reside".

I move amendment No. 6: In page 10, line 32, to delete "to" and substitute "and in the presence of".

I thank the Minister for taking on board amendment No. 7. This is very welcome legislation. It will ensure for the first time ever we will have an effective sex offenders register in this country. To have an effective sex offenders register, the member of the force who will be monitoring a sex offender needs to be able to make contact with and interview him or her, take his or her fingerprints and photograph, and so forth. We will come to the photograph issue later and why it is so important to be able to take his …

Will the Minister clarify that she is satisfied the other provisions already in legislation will ensure that reciprocal arrangement will be in place within the common travel area and outside that more generally? I welcome the provision in amendment No. 14 to allow a photograph of a convicted sex offender to be provided to a third party where it is necessary to identify that offender to protect either a vulnerable adult or child. I will not dwell on this, but I again highlight amendment No. 20, which is in my name. …

I want to come back on amendment No. 20. The Minister said it is important that the information is shared. I acknowledge the Bill provides a legal mechanism for the Garda to share information for the first time, something which was not available up to now, and expose members of the force that provided very relevant and valid information. My problem is that the Minister believes it is important that the information is shared. I agree with her. The difficulty is that in the circumstances I have spoken about, if an in…

Will the Minister double-check, before the Bill goes to the Seanad, that that is the case, as she has set out?

My interpretation is different. I accept the Minister's bona fides.

I move amendment No. 20: In page 18, to delete lines 9 to 36. On foot of the Minister's assurance, I will withdraw the amendment.

I move amendment No. 34: In page 20, between lines 29 and 30, to insert the following: “(c) in subsection (4), after “respondent” where it secondly occurs, to insert the following: “or protecting the victim of previous crimes from harassment”,”. We discussed this in detail privately. The amendment relates to protecting the victims of previous crimes from harassment from a convicted sex offender following the release of the offender from prison. Sadly, this intimidation is all too common. Covert intimidation takes p…

I move amendment No. 38: In page 30, after line 35, to insert the following: “30. The Minister shall, within 90 days of the passing of this Act, make regulations under section 60 of the Act of 2018 making it an offence to erase information regarding convictions for sexual offences as set out in section 3 of the Principal Act.”. We are moving on to the two final amendments with regard to issues that we have discussed on Committee Stage. I have highlighted the first key weakness in my amendments earlier. The second k…

I only have a short period of time but, for example, on 13 November Shane Phelan published an article entitled "Pimps and sex offenders among those using 'right to be forgotten'". In the article he pointed out that "press coverage of the activities of a criminal who was behind a multi-million-euro vice ring has been 'forgotten' by Google following requests under EU privacy law...". He went on to give examples of where this has been used to delist very serious criminal offences, stating "The Irish Independent is als…