Paula Butterly (Louth, Fine Gael)

I thank Mr. French for his opening statement. I was particularly struck by his level-headedness. Very often when there are tragedies like this in families, there is very much a knee-jerk reaction of calling for the immediate enactment of legislation. I was really impressed by his logic about the presumption of innocence and seeing it through to conviction because anything else could potentially be damaging. It is really hard to be able to see through that, particularly when you are in the centre of such circumstances.

From Mr. French's opening statement, I see he is advocating for suspension whereas others might have asked for a permanent removal of guardianship. The stakeholder comments are that by suspending, it is not necessarily going to infringe on any constitutional rights and it is most likely the best way forward. He also mentioned court discretion. Listening to what my committee colleague said, my interpretation is that the word "shall" should be changed to "must" in the context of the enactment of an order that would automatically suspend any guardian rights. I am interested to hear Mr. French's thoughts on whether, on conviction, there is no court discretion to suspend or not. Rather, it is automatic there and then on application on sentencing. Does he believe that to be the case? Is that what the purpose of it is, rather than waiting for the family courts further down the line?