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

We do trust people. We trust adopted people. That is why they are being provided access to all information. Nothing is held back any more. We trust them with the name of their mother, and of their father if it is on record, and the names of all their relatives. In the past they were not trusted with that. We trust them and this legislation provides access to that information. They do not have to sign anything. There is no criminal prohibition if, having heard the no-contact preference, they decide to ignore it. There is no consequence set out in this legislation. I do not believe they will do that but there is nothing there to prevent it because we trust people. It is right that we are discussing the sense, belief and understanding of the adopted person. However, we have to recognise there is a set of people - it is a very small set but they are there - and mothers who desperately want to maintain their secrecy. They exist. We have to understand that, through this legislation, we will be revealing their names to their children and for a small set of people, primarily women, that will be deeply distressing. We need to recognise that we are dramatically limiting their privacy rights. The question is how we ensure that their privacy rights, though limited, are still somehow present in this process. The State has a responsibility here because, inasmuch as we have a responsibility to provide access to the right to identity, which we are doing under this legislation, an Irish person's privacy right is a constitutional one and the State has to protect that as well. We have an obligation on both sides to protect rights and we are balancing those two sets of rights. That is difficult but we believe this is the best way to do that.

The Deputy raised concerns about disagreements about what is said and the information. There is not information in the call. What the call will involve is the list of points set out in section 17(2). That is what the call is, and nothing more. The information will be conveyed separately, either by post or email, after the information session has taken place. There does not need to be any dispute there because all the designated person is conveying to the relevant person are the points set out in section 17(2). That will be the end of it. The information session will then completed and the adopted person will get full access to all information.

Deputy Bacik also asked about what would happen if an adopted person decided they did not wish to engage with this process. That is a right. As I said earlier when the Deputy was not in the room, adopted persons continue to have their rights under the GDPR and can make an application for information under Article 15. However, the issue there is that Article 15.4 still applies and the balancing that has to be undertaken under the GDPR will still apply. What is so important about this legislation is that the balancing does not apply. The adopted person gets full access to all information in all circumstances.