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

I am clear that I want the recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly to be implemented. There is a commitment in the programme for Government to do so. Some of them are constitutional recommendations and obviously will require a referendum. Until such time as we have a clear wording in front of us and the legislation is passed, any referendum is potential so we will just have to accept that. However, I am very clear that we want to bring the constitutional changes forward. We do not have a date as yet. I must be upfront that there is no date.

Aside from responding to the committee's invitation, one of the reasons I am eager to be here today is to understand. There is quite broad acceptance and agreement that we must change the Constitution, but what we are going to do is not agreed. That fits into what the Chairman was saying. How do we implement this report? There was an effort made by the previous Government to deal with the issue of Article 41.2. The then Government took one position and others took another position, so there was a lack of agreement and nothing happened. I am unclear as to the role of this committee in terms of advising and engaging on the legislative text. There possibly are disagreements, even in this group. I, my Department and the Government would appreciate engagement with this committee about how we get agreed wording on the various pieces. The last thing we want is a referendum campaign where the Government is arguing one side and the Opposition is arguing something else, because that is almost certainly going to be lost and we will be back to square one.