Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Let us take it that there are 3,000 Roma in Ireland, according to one of those figures. It is a noble cause to integrate the Roma. I have had a lot of experience of the Roma in Budapest, Hungary. I am also familiar with some of them here in Ireland. It is right that they, no more than Travellers, should not be discriminated against. We have legislation to prevent discrimination against Travellers and the days of throwing a Traveller out of a pub are over.

Is Mr. O'Gorman aware of the extreme difficulties, even today in Ireland, in attracting Traveller children into the educational system at primary and secondary level, and retaining them there? I am speaking about schools that are most accommodating, including St. Dominic's in Ballyfermot, where they are trying to provide a wonderful education system for the Labré Park Traveller children. However, the most recent statistics from that school show that the retention rate is slipping because of socio-economic problems on the site and the attitudes of the Traveller community. The school is extremely worried, although it has the yellow flag for accommodating them.

The Roma community here has many more additional problems than Travellers. The State is trying to accommodate them, but is Mr. O'Gorman familiar with the difficulties we are having? There seems to be an increase in problems, perhaps because of conditions on sites where they are living, as well as the abuse of drugs and alcohol, hopelessness and suicide. Mr. O'Gorman might give us his opinion on those matters.

Mr. O'Gorman used the term "human rights defenders" and he has chosen nine. How did he pick nine from all the human rights defenders in the world? I was at the Front Line Defenders event in Dublin City Hall where a Mauritanian was awarded the Front Line Defenders award for exposing slavery in Mauritania. I get confused about who picks these people. We have been fighting the human rights issue of Nijinsky in Russia. In addition, there are others imprisoned in Siberia and elsewhere in Russia but we do not hear them being mentioned. How, therefore, does the international community decide which ones will be exposed in the headlines?

Ireland has been to the forefront in enacting legislation to outlaw female genital mutilation. Perhaps we should also be giving leadership on that in Europe. As a white Irish man speaking to Africans and challenging them on why FGM exists in their communities, I am conscious that it is almost a rite of passage in rural parts of Africa. Nonetheless, we do not condone it. I saw children in villages in Sierra Leone recently and it was like their holy communion or confirmation; it was a cultural event involving the whole village. In Europe, if there are any signs of female genital mutilation being pursued by parents or jujus on behalf of some communities, it has to be outlawed.

Should we concentrate on demands to outlaw it within the EU as opposed to exerting pressure on countries in Africa to outlaw it there?