Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

I am aware of the views of the Director of Public Prosecutions. There is little point in going back over old ground on the reasons for the 2006 Act but, in light of the decision of the Supreme Court in the CC case, the Government had a choice of either introducing emergency legislation that fully complied with that decision or doing nothing in the short term, which would have meant no offence of carnal knowledge of girls under 15 years of age.

The Joint Committee on the Constitutional Amendment on Children is examining the Twenty-eighth Amendment of the Constitution Bill, published in February 2007 by the Minister for Health and Children. It provided wording for inclusion in the Constitution on the rights of children which could be put to the people in a referendum. The wording included a provision that would allow the Oireachtas to pass laws providing for offences of absolute or strict liability committed against or in connection with children under 18 years of age. The committee is due to report to the Oireachtas by the end of November 2008. The Government will await the report of the joint committee. If one thing is clear from events of the past few years, this is not the type of decision that should be rushed. We do not intend to usurp the work of the committee nor to anticipate its report. However, we are in contact with the Attorney General on the options for legislation that might be available.

A referendum has by no means been ruled out. It is still a live option, but any decision to hold a referendum on the reintroduction of absolute liability would only be the beginning of a process. In a referendum, we would have to place before the people the general scheme of a Bill to give effect to what they would be asked to vote on. For example, the age below which absolute protection would apply, the age of consent, the question of sex amongst children of approximately the same age and the liability of persons in a position of authority or trust over the child would be among the issues that would have to be addressed in a general scheme. The people would have to know exactly what they were being asked to vote on. In addition, before asking the people to vote, the Government would like a broad level of agreement among the political parties on the wording of a constitutional amendment and the legislation following a "Yes" vote.

I am intent on fulfilling my duty to safeguard and increase the legal safeguards of all our citizens. Only yesterday, I met my colleagues in the European Union and we acknowledged that the protection of the rights and freedoms of our citizens is the first of the common values held by us as guardians within the Council. We agreed to make protecting children against crime, in particular crime of a sexual nature, an important objective.

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