Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I will do so briefly. While I understand the time available is open-ended, I will not do that to other Members.

This is a serious issue. It is highly disappointing that the Minister of State is unable to provide Members with a single example of what he is talking about. In the context of someone who might endanger himself or herself, he has told us that the consular service has had some involvement on occasion with Irish citizens abroad who are psychiatrically unwell. Sadly, that always will be the case. He has not suggested how that would have been detected by anyone in Dublin Airport before such people departed. He has not suggested what relevance any of that has to the issuing of passports.

Does he suggest that if the Irish consul in Cyprus were to discover that a person on holidays there was in need of mental health services, to make life easy, one simply would withdraw the person's passport and keep him or her in Cyprus? Alternatively, is he suggesting that when such people return to Ireland, one will take their passports from them instead of getting psychiatric help for them? The Minister of State's explanation makes absolutely no sense and he has not dealt with the issue I raised.

Some people are genuinely concerned in respect of a form of euthanasia now available in Holland of which some Irish citizens have availed. Is this an issue that could result in the Minister's intervention? Is this an issue that would result in the withdrawal of someone's passport because it might endanger that person?

I will suggest another scenario to the Minister of State. Court cases have arisen from the so-called pro-life amendment, some of which were taken by organisations and individuals. Some have related to young teenagers who had become pregnant, were in care and in circumstances in which they were seeking a termination abroad and had a right to travel. Will this provision be invoked or will some of the aforementioned organisations and groups invoke this provision on the theory that pregnant teenagers or pregnant adult Irish women going abroad to terminate a pregnancy should be deprived of a passport because using a passport might result in them endangering themselves? Is the Minister of State opening up a hornets' nest in a manner that is not understood in the Department of Foreign Affairs? If the Minister of State tells me the Minister, rather than third parties, will have this power, he should realise that some of the groups that have engaged in litigation will not think twice about taking proceedings against him to require him to remove someone's passport. Is the impact of this unnecessary and careless wording understood? The legislation is opening up issues. That the Minister of State has not been able to cite a single example of the circumstances to which subsections (3) or (4) will apply indicates that the measure has not been thought through properly.

The Minister of State mentioned that the State could refuse the right to travel if it were in the common good. This judgment was first delivered many years ago by Mr. Justice Finlay when he was President of the High Court. I need to make a declaration of interest in that I was representing an unmarried mother who was seeking a passport for her child. It was decided there was a right to travel and it was the first case in which the constitutional right to travel was declared. Wisely, Mr. Justice Finlay did not declare it an absolute right but one that could be constrained in circumstances related to the common good. From my recollection of the judgment, I believe the common good he had in mind was when national security, the security of another state, public safety or the safety of the person or life of others is endangered. He used the phrase "common good" as a generic phrase to cover the circumstances the Minister of State is now spelling out. It was not used as some additional overall discretion to lob in for the hell of it. The Minister of State cannot identify one single instance to which it will apply in refusing or recalling a passport. The provision therefore has no business being in the legislation.

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