Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)

That is most surprising and unfortunate. The Minister of State stated that the court would have to do what I, in my amendment, ask that it should do. If that is the Minister's intent, why can we not be explicit in making it the intent?

The following simple wording is what I want to insert: "which appeared to the High Court to be a sum which might be realised by the person to whom the order is directed". For the sake of clarity, there is no difficulty in the Oireachtas laying out that as a condition of imprisonment. I am not sure the Minister of State was correct in stating what would be automatically the case. Unfortunately, there are too many people already in the prison system for the non-payment of monetary fines, but that is a separate argument.

The amendment is a worthy one. The Minister of State has accepted the principle of it and I have no idea why he will not accept the substance of it.

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