Mr. Barry Ryan:

I thank the Deputy for the very useful comments. As the Minister of State mentioned and as we noted earlier, the provisions in the general scheme are very much framed around transparency and seek to replicate online what is offline, in terms of posters, election literature and so on. What is always a challenge, and internationally this has been shown to be the case, is the balance between the regulation in this space and maintaining the right to freedom of expression. We are very aware of the initiatives and the progress and developments at European and international level in this area. Nevertheless, as the Minister of State noted, we are probably one of the first to dip our toe in the water in respect of the regulation of online political advertising in any regard.

As for the money issue, it was mentioned earlier that we have a robust spending and donations regime. Spending online by political players for an electoral event comes within the spending limits and the regulation that is in place under the Electoral Act 1997. Spending in that regard falls within those limits.

I might pass to Ms Woods to respond to the questions about the register.