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

The FOI Act ensures that organisations can charge fees. Perhaps Digital Rights Ireland will have some practical experience of this. If someone submits a huge request, the body from whom the request is sought can say, "Sorry, that is a crazy request and we are going to charge you." It is important to put forward in legislation that this is our aim and if issues arise, we will address them with amendments at a later stage. The aim of this legislation is something we want to achieve. It is to impose an obligation to protect the archive. The archivists might support the protection of the archives but does the director general or the board of RTÉ? As I said, there is a wider societal failure to support and understand the importance of archives. It is not about Ms Dooley but the next director general and board. We impose plenty of other obligations on the board and director general including that they comply with other legislation. This Bill is a much stronger way to do this than providing encouragement to make a commitment. How many times have we given encouragement to make a commitment, that commitment is made and then the public service body does not meet its commitment, perhaps for reasonable reasons? Again, encouraging a body to make a commitment is incredibly stilted. It needs to be in legislation in order that it can happen.