Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

It is not acceptable that that should happen in a democratic Assembly. I contrast my treatment in this House with the treatment of Deputy Kenny, who was allowed to make a reflective speech without interruption from this side of the House. He was able to make his speech in circumstances of dignity, even though some of us on this side disagreed radically with some of the things he was saying. I appeal to the Deputies who were shouting and roaring earlier but have now fled to consider that a Minister of whatever party in this Assembly is entitled to get a fair hearing and to deliver his speech in fair and reasonable circumstances, without having to raise his voice to be heard over a cacophony of noise.

I apologise to the House for the fact that copies of my script were not ready to be submitted to Members this morning. They were not ready because I had to deal this morning with a problem in the Bill that I discovered overnight. That delay robbed me of a vital 20 or 30 minutes when I was preparing my script which would have enabled me to have the script in tickety boo order for circulation among Deputies. I am sorry that such problems were experienced, but I had to concentrate on looking after the interests of kids, which was more important. As I have said, I discovered overnight that the provisions relating to cross-examination, which protect rape victims from having their sexual histories gratuitously thrown in their faces to do them damage in court, were absent from this legislation. One of the amendments which has been tabled today relates to that matter. I apologise if the attention I deflected so I could remedy that problem caused some Members of the House to have to listen to what I was saying instead of reading it, if they were going to do either, which most of them were not.

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