Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Attorney General's advice and although there is a case before the court, I had hoped that would have been an end to it because it would have addressed what families have asked to be addressed. If it does not stand the test of the court, I urge the Minister of State to look at it again to ensure there will not be a difficulty in the future. The Bill does not address it and the Attorney General's advice is that we do not need to address it because it is, in some way, covered. It obviously has not been covered to date and that is the problem. The advice was not available in that certificates were not issued, otherwise families would not have gone to court to try to ensure their child was included on the stillbirth register.

I am happy there is some progress and that some discussion has taken place on this but we need a commitment that if the findings of the court are contrary to the advice from the Attorney General, we will come back to this quite quickly and look at the proposal Deputy O'Dea and others have. There is a range of ways to tackle this. It would require a single paragraph in legislation if the court does not accept the Attorney General's advice.