Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

One of the pieces of business scheduled for tonight is the renewal for another year of the Criminal Justice (Amendment) Act 2009. Under the legislation, it is required that the Government bring a report on the operation of that Act. I do not want to take up too much time on this. In essence, that report amounts to four pages, double spaced, which, in fact, tells us no case was sent forward to the non-jury Special Criminal Court last year and no one was charged under the provisions. We need to have a debate on that matter rather than simply rubber-stamping this. I raised this issue last year. I ask that, instead of using the time to debate what is proposed tonight - I know it is time sensitive - the matter be referred to the justice committee so that we could have a debate tomorrow in regard to the matter. On the notion of our simply taking what is outlined as a rubber-stamping exercise, what I propose would free up the time tonight to have statements or questions on the matters raised by other Deputies.

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