Mr. Bernard Gloster:

If I took the Senator up correctly, I think the question most relevant to Tusla was about the data protection impact assessment on the mother and baby homes commission database. When we received the database at the close of the year, when that emergency legislation was brought through the Oireachtas, we did extensive work with the information that was available to us and produced a data protection impact assessment report, which we made widely available. We did it on the basis of saying it was iterative and that anybody could comment on it as we progressed, and this would remain the case until such a time as this legislation emerged. This legislation will cause us to revisit that data protection impact assessment in a different way, and hopefully, in a much more significant way in terms of the process of information being released to people as intended in this Act.

We are processing requests relating to our paper records and the mother and baby homes commission database. I am sure it will be to no one's surprise that the combination of the receipt of the database and the conclusion of the commission increased significantly the volume of queries and various requests that we received, be those under freedom of information, FOI, requests, subject access requests or requests for tracing services. The numbers in quarter 1 of this year were significant.