Ms Julie Ahern:

To add to my colleagues' points about the Garda and the need for additional resources, the other issue to consider after the Bill is passed is the need for some type of protocol between the online safety commissioner and the Garda so they can communicate effectively. With regard to what Ms Cooney said about children going to the Garda and getting inconsistent reports, we hear that all the time from our members too. What needs to happen is that the Garda must know how it can interact in a way that ensures it does not breach GDPR in contacting the online safety commissioner, and to have a professional protocol in place whereby they can both notify cases to each other. That would help to alleviate stuff that might go to the online safety commissioner that would, perhaps, not be in the commissioner's remit and it could be referred back to the Garda and the other way round. That is in addition to what my colleagues have said.

With regard to the intention to split, we would be incredibly concerned about that. As the committee knows, the audiovisual media services directive at European level has taken approximately ten years to get to the current position. If we have to wait another ten years, who knows what harm could happen to children online?