Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I also ask the Minister of State to clarify the position. The point of our amendment is to provide the maximum possible amount of time for the public to have an input into a strategy or a revision to a strategy. I take the point that if one makes something, one still has to put it into a document that is consumable by the public. I understand that rationale to some extent.

Our amendment is designed to give the public the maximum possible opportunity in this regard.

One issue in terms of amending our amendment is that we refer to advertising things in the newspaper. The Bill also does this. I would be interested in hearing the Minister of State's views on that matter. It strikes me that this is a bit of a hand-me-down from previous formulations in the context of people getting their information about what is happening from newspapers. For better or for worse, many people do not read newspapers these days. In light of the new forms of media that exist, should we think about using these to notify the public? I am not just talking about this strategy; I am referring to every instance where public notification is referred to. I brought this up during the debate on the Maritime Area Planning Bill. We should really think about that as well. It is kind of a side issue of this amendment. It is mentioned in the amendment and in the relevant section. Is it not a bit archaic to just refer to newspapers? Radio is certainly a big medium via which people pick up on notifications. We hear announcements on the radio informing people that the Government is doing this, that or the other. We should probably formalise that to deal with circumstances we have to notify the public. In the context of the dreaded social media, as well as appearing in newspapers, these notifications should go out via various other modes of communication.