Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)

I thank the Minister for his reply. I understand what he said about aggravating circumstances and taking that into account. He used words in his reply such as "should", expect" and "can". When it comes to racism, however, there can be no exceptions. It needs to be one of the factors taken into account in sentencing. The State's response to the UPR, universal periodic review, recommendations stated it would be unconstitutional to introduce sentencing guidelines for racially motivated crimes. Was this on the advice of the Attorney General?

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