Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Let me paraphrase it then. I thought it would be more effective to quote directly from the report. The Ombudsman has consistently said the remit must be extended to include prisons and all matters pertaining to asylum and related justice issues. Given that the Minister is a member of the Labour Party with what I understood to be a particular view of these matters, I would have thought he would be enthusiastic to ensure people who are either in custody or going through an asylum, refugee status or naturalisation process would have fair recourse to the Ombudsman. He has said he will initiate various processes, which begs the question as to why he would duplicate a system in place. It does not answer the fundamental issue. What is he hiding? Is he so afraid of what might come out of the prison system or what people within the asylum system might bring to the attention of the Ombudsman that he is making a deliberate calculation to keep them out of the system? That is the only way I can logically account for his approach. It appears that he has buckled under pressure from the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter, which is a pity.

See this speech in context