Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 8:

In page 11, line 13, to delete "may" and substitute "shall".

We have argued this point already. Under the proposed legislation, the Minister will not be required to review the indices used in calculating periodic payments orders, PPOs, every five years but may do so, if so inclined. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to know that when the word "may" is used in legislation, rather than "shall", it happens rarely rather than often. We are dealing with the lives of people who have been catastrophically injured and will need medical care for the rest of their lives. In the past ten years alone, things have been so unpredictable in the financial world, etc. and there are more frequent and haphazard fluctuations than before. For these reasons, we believe the word "shall" should be inserted instead of "may" in order to give a little more protection to those who need it.