It is a Government amendment?

I apologise for being late as I was at a meeting of the justice committee. I ask the Minister to clarify a couple of points. When we hear the Garda appealing for dashcam footage from ordinary road users, is there any problem with the use of such material evidentially? I sometimes wonder whether I can go around my neighbourhood willy-nilly with my dashcam on or if there is any control on my doing so as a local vigilante or whatever I might be. Second, do gardaí have dashcams right now or is it intended that as we go…

Is that dealt with in the Bill?

Is there an admissibility argument in respect of dashcam footage harvested from members of the public? Is there a GDPR issue with producing that kind of material in court or is it used purely for the purposes of background investigation?

I welcome the Tánaiste here today. In respect of what he has said, not one word could I disagree with. I endorse everything he has said 100%. What has been said by other speakers is equally true. Hamas is an extremist Islamist terrorist organisation. It is not the Palestinian people. It is dedicated to the destruction of Israel. It is dedicated to the reversal of the 1948 expulsions of Arabs and the reintegration of a single Palestinian land. Hamas is backed by Iran in all of this. What was done the other day was d…

I will finish on this. I see the Tánaiste shaking his head. I remember when this House passed the-----

-----settlements Bill, we were foot-tripped in the Dáil and we were foot-tripped here. We were told it was against European law. That was untrue then and it was shameful.

One needs a school bus in the bad weather.

I have one point to make regarding the conversations that have been happening in the wings of this House and in respect of the business before us. The previous Seanad passed the Control of Economic Activity (Occupied Territories) Bill 2018, which was measured legislation that was designed to fly a flag against the creeping annexation of the West Bank by settlers encouraged by the Netanyahu Government. We were frustrated at every angle in progressing it. We were told the Bill would breach EU law. At a later stage, w…

I just want to say a few words about the implications of what is about to happen in Gaza, by all appearances. It appears the Israeli Defense Forces are about to invade Gaza. They have laid down a sort of zone for clearance by at least half of the people of Gaza, which has 2.2 million people, and they want them to move south. What happens when they move into that area? Will the Israeli Defense Forces destroy it? Will Hamas be there to fight them, or will Hamas do what it is best at, which is hiding among civilians a…

Cuirim fáilte roimh an t-Aire. In regard to this Bill, I can see there is a kind of hole in our economic security apparatus if I may put it that way, that this Bill is necessary to address. The principle of the Bill that we are debating today is something with which I have no major difficulty. It seems to me, bearing in mind what Senator Crowe and the Minister of State have said, that we should ensure that FDI is not overly burdened by bureaucracy in regard to relatively straightforward transactions which excite no…

At the outset, I wish to indicate that at one point I was involved on behalf of Lucia O'Farrell in legal proceedings. I am no longer involved in those proceedings. I declare that before anybody makes some point about it. The O'Farrell family knows that nothing that can be done now can bring Shane back. They also know that nothing can be done to reverse the outcome of the trial of Mr. Gridziuska; it cannot be reversed. However, faced with the circumstances that they were faced with, they had a simple choice: did the…

In relation to what is happening in Gaza I want to make some remarks. What happened last Saturday must be classified as utterly unforgivable, utterly wrong and completely inexcusable. To invade across an internationally recognised boundary, round up people and slaughter them and bring some of them back across the boundary for the purpose of making them hostages is a crime against humanity, in my view, and cannot be excused. I was extremely worried, then, when I heard Prime Minister Netanyahu say that the Israeli re…

I welcome the Minister of State. It is a sad day that outside every criminal court in Ireland, the barristers' profession is standing in protest against the unjust actions of our Government, which has been blind to a serious unfairness visited on them. From 2008 to 2011, there was a reduction in barristers' fees, in light of the economic crisis of the time, of between 28% and 69%. In real terms, there has been a reduction of 40% in legal aid fees for barristers since 2002. Nearly everybody else in any criminal cour…

Briefly in reply, I welcome the Minister of State's remarks. Indeed, I welcomed the view taken by the Minister for Justice at the event I referred to earlier but it is not good enough that a Department of State, which is part of a collective Government, should leave us in a position whereby the Director of Public Prosecutions conducted a review, recommended the ending of these cutbacks but nothing has been done for more than ten years now. It simply is not good enough. It suggests that there is an agenda in the Dep…

Five years and eight months ago, the Taoiseach delivered an address to this House nine months after his appointment as Taoiseach on St. Brigid's Day, Lá Fhéile Bríde. He told us he wanted to share his thoughts on the reform of Irish politics. He told us that while he had originally supported the abolition of the Seanad, the people had spoken and the matter would not be revisited. He told us his programme for Government committed him to the implementation of the Manning report, and he added that he was happy to do s…

I have a copy of the all-party report, which the Taoiseach ignored-----

There was in the previous one. The Taoiseach said he would honour it but he did not.

That is not proposed. That is a direct untruth.

Respect for the truth comes before respect for the man. The Taoiseach is telling us untruths here.