Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

This is the way officials in the public service will interpret the legislation, that a request can cover a couple of Departments. What we have here are some bad cases where people tried to save €60. Is the Minister here today to talk about saving €60 or getting an extra €60 from a journalist? Is that the essence of his amendment? He is making the case why somebody should have to paying five charges of €15 instead of just one. The matter is so trivial that we should not be discussing it. At this point we should not even be discussing the charge of €15. However, the Minister is committed to charging a fee of €15 and we are debating whether we can get two or three charges of €15 from a journalist. He has constructed exactly the same case involving repetitive, vexatious and extensive requests.