Ms Sin?ad Gibney:

I will not comment again - respecting the limit and jurisdiction of the UK Government - on the question of intent or otherwise. It is important to recap. Deputy Tully spoke about the equality picture on either side of the Border. Obviously, the commitment in the Good Friday Agreement - the Belfast Agreement - was really about bringing Ireland, this side of the Border, up to the same level. As the Deputy has identified, what we have now is a picture whereby Northern Ireland is perhaps now the one that is lagging. I think I referenced in our last visit - just to say again that I would be happy to circulate this - that there is some really interesting academic literature in this space. Professor Christopher McCrudden and Professor Brice Dickson have both written about it. When it is mapped out, although they are not identical in their protections, there is a roughly similar size of protections on both sides of the Border but they are weak in different areas. It is important to acknowledge that this is a moving picture. There is much more progress here than there would be in Northern Ireland. For example, the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth is currently reviewing equality law. We will be inputting into that submission.

Examples really bring this to life. One of the examples from the report we are discussing today is the European Accessibility Act, which is a directive that aims to improve the functioning of the Internal Market for accessible products and services. These would be products used by older people and people with disabilities. The deadline for member states to implement the provisions of the Act was June 2022. It will become effective in 2025. This means that the UK Government is not required to transpose it, whereas we must do so. That means that work is underfoot here. When that happens in 2025, there will be a different experience of standards and of products. It will have a real, deep impact on the people who use those products and their experience of them on both sides of the Border. That is a real example of where equality will be quite stark for people, particularly groups such as disabled people and older people.

I know time is running out but I will speak briefly on racism. I acknowledge it is an issue in both jurisdictions. The National Action Plan Against Racism has now been published - following a 12-year gap, essentially - and we await that. I would like to call out one of the biggest gaps we have in this area, which is data. There is a real need to capture the data. That applies not only to the very specific area around the electronic travel authorisation, ETA, but more generally and it applies to racial profiling.

As we see it, the potential for racial profiling by An Garda Síochána cannot be measured right now because we do not yet have that data. I do not want to take up any more time. I know the Deputy has more questions.