Ms Aoife O'Leary:

We have confined our submission to the proposal that is in the Bill. The current position is there is both legislative and judicial recognition that there may be cases where there is a basis for disclosing a particular record, and that has been set out and acknowledged in the AM case. The current section 19A seeks to permit a judge to balance the privacy rights of the complainant and the duty to ensure that the trial is fair. We have confined our submission to the procedures around how a record might be disclosed. The AM case recognised that consent to disclosure must be informed consent, and we have focused on that aspect. Any consent that is given must be on the foot of independent legal advice, which would be given privately to the complainant. Perhaps there should be a requirement that the independent legal adviser would confirm to the court that the independent legal advice has been provided to the complainant and on foot of that advice, the complainant wishes to consent to the disclosure of the particular record.