John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

What we just had was a rehashing of all the Taoiseach's arguments on the perceived benefits of the public services card. The Data Protection Commissioner accepts those points, but she says the process is totally illegal. The collection and retention of individuals' data is completely illegal. I again urge the Taoiseach to issue the third party legal advice. I accept it is the practice that advice from the Attorney General is not made public but there is a strong argument for the third party advice to be issued.

Some 3.2 million people had no choice but to get the public services card because it was mandatory but not compulsory. Reading between the lines, the Government is not going to implement the findings of the Data Protection Commissioner and will continue to illegally implement the use of the public services card and essentially put it up to the Data Protection Commissioner to initiate enforcement proceedings so that the case ends up in the court. That is an unfortunate continuation of the waste of public funds.

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