Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair and I welcome the witnesses. I have a couple of questions around the practicalities of the New Zealand and the Australian models. Can assessment be started before the six-month period that was referred to? Can a person start the assessment and make the application, so that they have their ducks in a row, so to speak, for when they reach the six-month threshold?

Regarding the people who did not take the medication - the witness mentioned polling - was it part of the polling? If not, why not? Can the witnesses speak to us around some of that, because I think it could provide an interesting and valuable insight.

What other information on polling could be relevant to the committee? It would be great if that could be shared with us, perhaps even offline if there is a report that could be emailed to the committee.

Several witnesses who have spoken to the committee have been concerned about this idea of the slippery slope and of the social impact of this, in that it sends a message that some people's lives inherently do not have dignity. I refer to the social impact of any legislative change. Having seen through that legislative change, could the witnesses speak to both of those issues?

I have a quick question for the Medical Council, which shared information around conscientious objection. It deals with complaints around doctors and doctors' practice. Are there complaints around conscientious objection, whether that is people complaining about a doctor who was objecting to treatment but outside of the standards and guidelines or whether it is a doctor trying to conscientiously object but not being allowed to do so? Does the Medical Council receive those kinds of complaints? Are they increasing or reducing? What is the pattern? In terms of rough percentages - I appreciate Dr. Crowe might not have the figures to hand - is it large? Is it a minority of complaints? If she wants to feed those exact figures back to us later, that would be fine.