Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)

I welcome the Minister's frank explanation, which is a significant advance on last year. We are trying to grapple with difficult issues and nobody is gainsaying that. The Minister is correct that we are making law that has general application. However, I did not have the case of an 18 year old gay man who has a 16 year old boyfriend in mind. I have in mind a 16 year old boy being inveigled into a sexual act by a much older man. When she decriminalised homosexual acts between consenting males and set the age of consent at 17, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn felt it was important in doing so to insert a zone of protection for those aged between 15 and 17 years so it would not be open to older people to inveigle children into sexual acts with them. There is still a case for that. I had to read the Ferns Report in detail because it concerned my constituency. This issue so parallels many of the offences in that report, particularly those committed by Sean Fortune, and they comprised the bulk of the charge sheet against him, but those charges no longer exist. I am not content that is right, although there is obviously some logic to the Minister's explanation. My preference is to err on the side of the zone of protection, even if it is intrusive in respect of young people. On whether boys of 16 years should be engaged in this sort of behaviour, I am not saying it should be criminalised for the 16 year old, and it would not be under this provision. However, it would be for the older man, someone over 17 years. There is a case for it.

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