Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

On the CPO point, the idea is to allow the State to intervene on a temporary basis. There is provision in the Bill to intervene and take possession of land on a short-term basis and, if seen as necessary, potentially pay compensation. Again, because of the constitutional protection of property rights we have to have these processes in place but they are temporary rather than permanent.

The Senator asked about situations where there has been an intervention by this agency and not all of the bodies exhumed have been identified. The agency has a specific mandate to make provision for the dignified reburial of those remains. That is very important, particularly in places with high numbers of burials such as Tuam. We are going to make every effort to identify remains but where that is not possible it is important that we make provision for respectful reburial. That is key to what we are seeking to achieve here.

As regards the coroner, we will be very clear that we do not want anything in this legislation that will be seen as a barrier to the conducting of the coronial process. The power of a coroner to conduct an inquest is granted in section 17 of the Coroners Act 1962. There is nothing in these heads that in any way limits that section. The two limitations mentioned are specific roles the agency will have. First, it has a role to exhume. We have to make sure that when an agency is appointed it has the sole power of exhumation. Second, it has the sole power of identification because we are giving this agency the power to undertake a very significant DNA-based identification process.

Regarding the transparency of the decision-making process, the key area where transparency will be needed is in the Government's accountability to the Oireachtas when making a decision on whether to intervene. That relates to the Minister of the day's accountability to the Dáil and the Taoiseach's accountability to the Dáil. Where the Government of the day considers an intervention and decides not to intervene, it is going to have to explain that and explain very clearly why the particular circumstances of a site did not warrant an intervention.