Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)

Yes, just to make an observation, although not specifically on surrogacy. The Minister has outlined quite well how this is one of those areas where nobody is responsible for it but everybody is responsible for it, yet when everybody is responsible, nobody is responsible. It is a difficulty. I have dealt with this legislation previously and it is one of those issues where there is no sense in providing the leave if the money is not going to be provided to pay for it. Sometimes, it is a case of wondering who is going to be the person to drive this. I would welcome a commitment from the Minister that his Department will try to drive this. It is an issue that is in the programme for Government. There is a lot of stuff in the programme for Government and we will, as the Minister encourages us to do with his speeches, check against delivery. This issue does not impact on a large number of people - it is a very small number of people - but it is still incredibly important, and where the political system has failed in the past and let people down, the damage has been huge. It is one of those issues where there can be a difficulty in getting a Department to drive the necessary change. When we debated the surrogacy legislation, there was very little difference between the parties, yet progress was very slow. I just wanted to make that observation.