Professor Denis Cusack:

I must give credit to the Senator's successors. When we met the late Brian Lenihan, who briefly served as Minister with responsibility for justice, we thought we were there but the recession hit us. In recent months, the Minister, Deputy McEntee, the Minister of State, Deputy Naughton, and parliamentary questions from Members of the Opposition have highlighted very much the proper questions to be asked. Much of the legislative reform has been passed. I will cite two examples. The first is civil legal aid, which is still imperfect and could be better but this could be said about the entire civil justice system. The other is maternal deaths and I worked on this with Clare Daly, when she was a Deputy, and her researcher. These are two very important reforms. Much has been done piecemeal but Parts 2 and 3 have not. Neither have sections 55 and 56 in the Bill, which deal with the recommendations. A good deal has been done but work on the financing, structure, organisation, the chief coroner's office and the coroner's investigator has not. Coroners are struggling to keep the service going. As the Senator said, we have struggled during Covid-19. Kildare was tragically hit by it and we provided a service there. We do this with the enormous help of the Garda, GPs, hospital consultants and others.