Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I will also discuss the mother and baby homes issue. It has been a very difficult few weeks in this regard, particularly for the survivors who wanted us all to work together and come up with a good solution for them. That, unfortunately, did not happen in the way it should have happened. There was a lack of consultation and an expedited process resulted in significant confusion on the issue. It is a very complex issue both legally and technically.

I have questions on the GDPR as this is an issue that we will have to keep revisiting and it will underpin much of the work that we do as we go forward. On 16 October, the Minister stated in the Seanad that he had been advised by the Attorney General that the right to access personal data in Article 15 of the general data protection regulation is expressly restricted by section 35 of the Commissions of Investigations Act 2004. The Minister repeated that point on 22 October in the Dáil. I find this confusing. How did we get from that point to the statement by the Attorney General on 28 October that the 2004 Act does not preclude consideration of requests under GDPR?

I have written to the Minister's office to ask for a timeline of the advice from the Attorney General and that from the Data Protection Commission, DPC. I have not received that yet but it is important to establish when that advice was given to the Minister. Will he confirm that it was the Attorney General who gave him the advice on the points he made on 16 October in the Seanad and 22 October in the Dáil regarding GDPR? It is important we ascertain what advice was given when and, as it will continue to come up for us as a committee and in respect of the legislation, will the Minister furnish us with the information and advice he was given on GDPR? This committee will have to deal with a lot of that as we go forward. I ask the Minister to answer those questions and then I wish to raise an issue relating to the survivors' groups.