David Norris (Independent)

I have often received excellent briefings from it and it has taken precisely the type of social position I would like to be embodied in the House's work. To find CORI callously stalling makes me wonder about the pleasure with which I will receive its briefings in future. All of the elements involved have made it a legal matter. This is what is costing money. I deprecate the self-congratulatory tone of the former Taoiseach, Deputy Bertie Ahern. It was inappropriate.

Regarding my amendment, it is a question of leadership, which I seek from the Leader. Significant elements in his party in the Upper and Lower Houses, including at ministerial level, agree with our position. The matter should be discussed. It is not for civil servants in the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform to block this House in the exercise of its democratic function. Regarding The Irish Times, I have never seen two pages of its letters page devoted to one subject and that is a significant indicator of the way in which this has become a major issue.

I wish to raise another issue which has been raised by Senator Mary White, that is, the question of the criminal record of some of these people. There was a letter yesterday from a woman who was taken to court at the age of two and, as she said, sentenced to 14 years in one of these institutions. What was that for? According to her, she has a criminal record. She objected strongly, as I do, to a letter which appeared previously from a person who said that all the young people who were put into these institutions were thugs. That is a disgusting remark to make about people who have suffered.

Regarding Northern Ireland, I signed the letter about journalistic sources. It is a very complex matter and it would be appropriate to have a debate on it because we can see from the newspapers today that we have what the former Dean of St. Patrick's, Victor Griffin, described as enough religion to make us hate. There is an appalling photograph of a woman with her face beaten into a pulp, whose husband was killed and a pregnant neighbour was attacked. They were attacked with baseball bats by people who apparently think they are Protestant. She was called a "Taig". It was a mixed marriage. She was Protestant and he was Roman Catholic, and what should it matter? How does that give licence to anybody to beat somebody else into a pulp?