Michael McNamara (Clare, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister very much for his reply although I do not believe it added a lot to what we already knew. We were aware that there are constitutional difficulties.

In his reply, the Minister stated he was afraid of the picking apart of rights enshrined in the Constitution and he questioned where this would stop. We have already re-examined the contours of rights in the Constitution. The right to liberty was re-examined when there was a constitutional referendum on bail, and the right to citizenship of every child born in the State was re-examined and narrowed such that it would apply only to every child born in the State to parents legally resident here. At this stage, in 2013, the Labour Party is not talking about the abolition of private property. I do not believe even Deputies Brian Stanley or Catherine Murphy would like to abolish private property at the stage. We are merely saying that the right to private property should be narrowed-----

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