Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

First of all, this matter has divided Irish society on many occasions in the past. Nobody under 50 years of age has actually voted on this question. I have no intention of presuming to know what the Citizens' Assembly will recommend or the proposals with which it may come forward. Who are the members of the Citizens' Assembly? They are ordinary men and women from all over the country, chosen at random by a polling company that tendered for the work on the basis of region, gender, age and so on. They are all ordinary people. They are tasked, under the direction of Ms Justice Laffoy, to consider the eighth amendment of the Constitution. They will go through that, I am quite sure, in great detail.

Is this process open? Yes. It is all streamed live. Can anybody from around the world make a submission to it? Yes, people can, including those from Northern Ireland.

The work of the assembly will be quite intensive, I would think, over a number of weekends when it starts to discuss the various elements of the eighth amendment. There are more than two possible outcomes, Deputy Burton. There are at least six different options that could be chosen, depending on the Citizens' Assembly and what it wants to do. I want to be clear on this - there is no political direction being given to it and there is no political cul-de-sac being put in place. Nobody under 50 years of age has voted on this issue in Ireland. It is something that obviously will create its own divisions again in our society as these discussions take place, but the Citizens' Assembly will not be making the decision. That will come back to the legislators here.

It is not for me to say whether Ms Justice Laffoy and the assembly will finish their work on the eighth amendment inside four months or five months. Ms Justice Laffoy, an esteemed member of the Supreme Court, said that she would hope to report to the Oireachtas. It is to the Oireachtas that the assembly will report, not the Government. The Oireachtas has approved the mandate for the Citizens' Assembly to do its work. I think that is a very valuable thing. The question of the eighth is one that requires rational, commonsensical, comprehensive and sensitive discussion. These ordinary people from all over the country will bring that to bear in their discussions.

To answer Deputy Eamon Ryan, I do not see any reason at all for the information that is made available to the assembly to be kept from public representatives in any way. It should all be public. Is that not what this is about? It is a Citizens' Assembly and, therefore, the information being made available to it should be available to everybody so that the national conversation about this issue can be held in a proper manner. In that sense, we do not want to have a situation where people feel excluded in any way. The proceedings of the assembly are streamed live. It is wide open and transparent. It is under the command of a very experienced Supreme Court judge. I do not believe, Deputy Adams, that it is in any way less effective than the previous citizens convention, which did include politicians and which ordinary people were a bit shy of in the beginning until they got an understanding of the work that could be involved. Whatever recommendations and whatever proposals come from the Citizens' Assembly will come back to this Legislature because it is to the Oireachtas that the assembly will report. It will not report to me or the Government, it will report to the Oireachtas. This is the people's issue. It is a national issue. As the Deputy knows, not a comma, full stop, word or line of the Constitution can be changed without the people's imprimatur.

I wished those participating at the assembly the very best in their contributions, thanked them for their commitment and their time in a voluntary capacity, thanked them for their courage and made a specific appeal, given that it is the first time that this issue has been dealt with in the age of digital communication, that those who appear on social media should allow these people the respect and time to give of their views on a sensitive issue in a way that we would all think fitting and to remember that remarks made on social media about comments being made by the Citizens' Assembly can sometimes have a devastating effect on people themselves. These are ordinary citizens chosen at random, willing and wishing to give of their participation in addressing a national issue. I hope that they are given the time and respect to do that in a way that they want to.

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