Mr. Kieran Feely:

As I have stated, I am aware of the criticism of the research room. The feedback from staff is that people are reasonably happy with it, although I accept the entrance is poor. Unfortunately, I am not the decision maker, which is the Office of Public Works. The criticisms have been well aired at this committee and by users of the facility, and they have been passed to the Office of Public Works, which has control of the matter. We have raised it with that body on more than one occasion, so I can really say no more on that.
I agree with everything that Deputy Murphy said about genealogy services being brought into line with those of Northern Ireland, on an all-island basis, as soon as possible. I am not answering questions in order but I will address all of them. If I leave out anything, it can be picked up later. All of the index records are available in data format and all of the register pages are available as digital images of microfilms. There are no gaps. All of the birth records from 1864 have been converted and are available on a live computer system. Deaths from 1864 to 1923 are not on the system, along with marriages from 1845 to 1902. It will take approximately three years to clean that data and ensure it is in a fit state for conversion.
It would be possible and desirable for the data to be put into an on-line and searchable facility without it being complete. It is largely complete in any case, and the births, which are the most important records, are all there. When that will happen is dependent on a number of issues. The law needs to change and I am told by the Department of Social Protection that the Minister intends to include appropriate provisions in the civil registration (amendment) Bill which is intended to be published this year. That will be subject to the parliamentary schedule, and members are probably just as able to comment on that as I would be. After that it is a technical exercise to extract data and pass it on to the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht for inclusion in the irishgenealogy.iewebsite.
Typically, these projects depend on the type of searchability that is included, and there are a number of technical questions to be addressed. It would be a big enough project and it could take 12 to 18 months. That is a guess, although I have reasonable experience of doing IT projects, so it is not a wild guess.