Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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-----including my questions concerning an individual's public rejection of the AS Ireland charter. Even just that would make him or her ineligible for promotion within a department or school that has adopted the charter. If people may have gender-critical views around people's sense of self, can the Minister give staff at third level colleges a guarantee that expressions of academic freedom will not negatively impact on employment, promotion or research eligibility? I ask the Minister to please not compare this to Nazi Germany. We are talking about academics who are concerned not to be bullied into using language that, in some cases, they regard as untruthful. We have highly contested stuff here. The Government has withdrawn its own hate speech Bill because a great number of people in our society are scratching their heads at the political insiderism that has led to such contested definitions of, for example, gender, as contained in that legislation. This is not like some kind of a fringe issue. There is serious concern among credible academics.