Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

The legislation on the constitutional convention will come before the Dáil and the Seanad next week. I hope the constitutional convention will have its first meeting in September. Work is proceeding on the children's referendum with the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs and different groups on a wording that can be agreed. I expect that the child protection referendum will be held in the autumn. I do not want to nominate a particular week until all is ready for the Bill to be published. That requires agreement among those groups that have done a great amount of work on the wording. I will keep the House updated on it, but it is my intention to have it in the autumn.

I have not fixed a date for a referendum on the abolition of the Seanad. That is outside the remit of the constitutional convention. The Government will publish the Bill in due course and put it to the people. We must have consideration for things like the fact we have the EU Presidency from 1 January until June 2013, but we will talk about these issues. The child protection referendum will be later in the autumn and a referendum on the Seanad will be at a later date.

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