Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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The committee is engaging with the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel which is an independent office. We have a preliminary paper from that office on that retrospective question but there will be a fuller assessment which will feed into the scrutiny report. We will be preparing a report and will have to come to a decision about the Bill so the constitutionality question is pertinent. The Attorney General will not come before the committee and give his view so this is our opportunity to tease that out. The Central Bank, in its detailed submission, also raised issues on that front.

I brought a Bill through the system relatively recently and Deputy Pearse Doherty has also brought legislation through the system. My experience is that, to get a Bill all the way through the system, enacted and into law, requires a lot of technical support, buy-in from the parent Department, parliamentary draftspeople and so on. Is it the position of the Department that it will not be co-operating or supporting the progression of this Bill because the Department is fundamentally opposed to it?