Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

The more I think about this Bill, the more convinced I am that it is a tactic, a device and a stunt which has backfired. The more I think about it, the more the words used by Deputy Kenny about the obligation set out in the 1997 Act, put through when he sat at the Cabinet table, appear utterly ridiculous. The more considered and reasonable people think about it the more it will become apparent that what happened here tonight was not a demonstration of concern for homeowners but an attempt to throw shapes in public and to capitalise on Deputy Kenny's Ard-Fheis speech in which he asked people to trust him to be cruder, rougher and tougher than anybody else in the fight against crime. It will not work in any arrangement where the parties to the Mullingar accord run this Bill under the microscope. Two pieces of legislation have been put forward. One is measured, reasonable and sensible, but the other is not. The Government will consider both over the next few months. It will also consider whether it is necessary to qualify the law by removing the obligation that one should retreat when defending one's home, garden, the curtilage of one's house and things such as one's car parked outside the door, from criminal acts. I believe the Government will give sympathetic consideration to an amendment of the law of this kind, but I cannot speak on behalf of my colleagues——

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