Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Amendment No. 34 was ruled out of order by the Chairman and I am not arguing with that decision. Opposition Members cannot propose amendments that amount to a charge on the Exchequer. The amendment states "An FOI body shall establish a facility by which payment or refund of any fees due under this Act may be made electronically". I am pleased to see that the Minister has inserted, at the end of the amendment No. 53, "An FOI body shall endeavour to establish a facility by which payment or refund of any fees due under this Act may be made electronically". It is not verbatim, or an absolute commitment with the phrase "endeavour", but it is almost the same as my amendment.

The Minister has taken my amendment and has added a word to give himself a bit of latitude. I acknowledge that although my amendment was ruled out of order, the Minister has taken the exact same amendment on board. It is important to say that because we give the Minister grief if we are not happy and we may as well recognise when the Minister does something good.

We have not yet come to amendment No. 57, which was also ruled out of order. Amendment No. 57 deals with cases where the records concern only personal information and suggests no search and retrieval fee should apply. In our discussion a few minutes earlier, the Minister said he wanted to provide for cases where there was a substantial amount of information. I am sure the Minister will be prepared to reconsider this point. The Minister tabled amendment No. 53, which states that the search and retrieval and copying charge under subsection (2) shall be disregarded unless the grant concerned relates to a significant number of records. I was asking for no search and retrieval fees for personal requests. In this amendment, the Minister provides for a search and retrieval fee if it amounts to a significant number of records.

I draw the attention of the Minister to the legislation as published and as discussed on Second Stage. Until last Friday, the legislation had the following provision in respect of search and retrieval fees in cases where someone makes a personal request.

The section states the fees for search and retrieval shall be disregarded for a personal request if, in the opinion of the head concerned, it would not be reasonable, having regard to the means of the requester and the nature of the record concerned, to include the cost specified in that paragraph. Up to last Thursday, the legislation stated that if the head of the section believed it was reasonable, having regard to the means of the person, not charge any search and retrieval fees, he need not do so. The Minister's amendment now states that the head can charge a fee if there is a significant amount of records involved. Will the Minister go back to what was in the legislation? He is creating another row for himself by introducing search and retrieval fees where there is a large amount of records involved and where it is personal information.

It is important that when this legislation is passed, the Minister can say there are no fees, whether for applications or search and retrieval for one's own personal information. That is the way it was until last Thursday. The head had the discretion not to charge fees. Will the Minister give the head the discretion he had until last Thursday? He is after opening up a row for himself by introducing a fee for search and retrieval of personal information. Bad and all as what we did in 2003, we did not make specific provision for a fee for search and retrieval of personal information. We left personal information-----