Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Anybody who wants to make a submission to the Department may do so. The programme is due for review and we will be getting somebody to carry it out for us. The same process will be used for the review as was used for the previous one. It involves the college in Maynooth, although the same people will not be used. We need to carry out the review and include some new areas.

I think I have covered all of the issues the Deputy raised, except the most important one, namely, the indemnity scheme. I will be very careful in what I say about that scheme. We have been working to develop a national indemnity scheme and it is a very complex matter. My Department has been advised that a scheme like the one envisaged will require legislation to be implemented. We will have to use two existing Acts, the Occupiers' Liability Act and the National Treasury Management Agency Act, which are under the control of other Ministers. Therefore, I will have to discuss the matter with the relevant Ministers. Officials from my Department are also having meetings with the Attorney General. We are making progress, but it is a complex matter, one that will require more than a simple legislative initiative. If I bring it forward, I want it to be right. I have given an undertaking that we will try to bring forward legislation. The reason we are not further on with it is that Brexit has been the priority in recent weeks. All other legislation has been put on hold. Brexit was the subject of the most important legislation we had to deal with. The Office of the Attorney General is heavily engaged with my office on this issue. I am also dependent on two other Ministers in the case of the Acts mentioned, but we are making progress. We need to do something about the issue because, as I have said previously, I cannot have a situation where there are claims against the family of landowners, their home and land. We need to deal with the issue and want to do so as quickly as possible as we have talked about it for a long time. We are now trying to implement legislation.