Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

That is what I am looking for. Since we began our work on the second phase of this process in January, a number of representative bodies have made these claims in front of the working group. I have met them formally and informally. We are looking for hard evidence. It is going to be a difficult thing to pursue. We cannot do anything unless we have actual evidence. When I met representatives of the Law Society last week or two weeks ago to discuss this issue, I said we will see what we can do to get evidence. In the absence of hard evidence, we will see whether further progress can be made to give businesses faith that solicitors' firms are not behaving in this kind of way. It is important for that to be achieved. We will need to look closely at the Statute of Limitations issue. I referred in my opening address to making an addendum to our current report in September. I would like to come to the committee in July with a clear indication of some of the big-ticket items we will have to address. They are not going to be easy to address. Potentially, they will involve constitutional issues that will have to be circumnavigated by the committee and the Government.

Decisions will have to be made about where the balance or burden of proof should fall when someone comes in and makes a claim at the eleventh hour as the two-year Statute of Limitations is coming to an end, when CCTV evidence is not available and the person who might have logged the claim if it were made at the time is not available to explain why this was not done. We have heard about such cases anecdotally. All of these things need to be looked at. It appears to me that when such cases arise, there is an unfair burden on the business to be able to make a fair defence. I hope to come back to this issue next month. I hope to be able to say at that stage exactly what we want to do about it. This is one of the two big issues that have been flagged with me by each of the groups I have met during the second phase.