Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank all of the speakers and proposers of the Bill for bringing this forward. I will touch briefly on the money message but also I have some questions on the specific content of the Bill.

On the money message, this has been very valuable because one could reference this ongoing discussion on radio, on television or in these institutions. I believe the public might ask what are they talking about as this is just a procedural matter and they should just get on with it. This has been useful, however, in underlining in the first instance the real implications for people's lives when valuable legislation is blocked. It also has underlined clearly, and we are not under any illusion, that this issue has not arisen previously because we have operated with majority Governments. Since we are operating with a minority Government at present, it is no longer in the same position to prevent Bills it did not like from getting through as had been the case previously . It has found another way through the non-provision of money messages. It is unfortunate that the Bills Office has taken decisions in some circumstances that a money message must be provided when that was a debatable point. Many of these decisions can be quite arbitrary. Although I am unclear as to the basis for it, there seems to be a higher threshold for the provision of a money message to go to Committee Stage than for a Bill to be put forward at Second Stage. There seems to be a threshold somewhere in between the two to put forward an amendment that may have some incidental cost. There is a lack of transparency in this regard and I believe Deputy Jack Chambers is correct that an action potentially could be taken on the basis of Article 17.2 of the Constitution. It has never arisen before because previously, a clear Government majority existed. I agree with everything that has been said to the effect that it is anti-democratic of a minority Government foisting its will on the majority through a procedural trick and that lack of transparency is unfortunate. That has been well ventilated but it is useful and if people want to respond, they can. If they have additional points that they wish to offer on this, they can. My questions go back to the substance of the Bill.

The first concerns a useful briefing document from the Oireachtas Library and Research Service on this legislation, in which a point identified referred to research conducted by Götzelmann on the legislation as it was prior to the most recent change to the Refugee Act 1996. The point that this was making was that one of the primary difficulties that existed at that stage was what was described as the nebulous definition of dependency. This was a point, I cannot quite recall, that may have been raised at Second Stage as well. My question is whether we will see the full benefit of this; and we may. If there are difficulties where it may favour the applicant or the Government's current position, that is, if it is insufficiently clear as to what is a dependant or what qualifies as dependency, will that potentially hamstring the intent of this Bill? Alternatively it may lead to a more expansive understanding of it, I am not entirely sure.