Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle. How is the role of the rapporteur distinguished from the existing role of the Ombudsman for Children? Surely this ought to be the task of the Ombudsman for Children who did her job admirably last week. Is the proposal not more window-dressing than reality? Is not the Ombudsman for Children equipped to do this job and why would we need a rapporteur?

Why does the Taoiseach seek to re-open the issue of whether the State ought to have anticipated an adverse finding in the Supreme Court decision on the CC case? Did experts outside this House not establish that the chaos that ensued was due to the absence of that anticipation and foreknowledge? Is it not the case that the apprentice solicitor who wrote the article in the Law Society Gazette said that in the Law Library and legal circles it was widely anticipated that once the defence of honest belief was put to the test it was likely that at a minimum subsection (1) would be struck down? If that was the widespread opinion held in legal circles how come it never reached the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform? That seems puzzling. Had there been such anticipation work could have been done on amending legislation that would have helped to head off much of the chaos of last week.

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