Pa Daly (Kerry, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Mac Lochlainn for introducing this motion. I wonder what kind of scrutiny is undertaken by the Government coalition parties when they introduce regulations such as this. In July we had a situation where, under Covid-19 legislation, a change in the law was brought about to facilitate vulture funds, which was spoken against by all Fianna Fáil Deputies in the Chamber at the time, and yet they voted the other way. Now we have a situation where the regulations opposed quite strongly by all Fianna Fáil Deputies are now being proposed by them. I wonder is there any communication between the various Government parties before items like this are brought before the House.

Recently I met some inshore fishermen and we discussed the overall grim economic situation in which they find themselves. Despite Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic, adequate supports have not been put in place for these fishermen.

The answer from the Government is to introduce regulations such as these on evidence that would not be sufficient for a warrant to search a person's house.

This is part of an overall trend by the Executive seeking out powers that are inappropriate, ramming them through or placing them within statutory instruments so that legislators cannot effectively scrutinise them. We have seen this in terms of legislation that has gone through these Houses. Rushed law makes for bad law. The concerns of the fishing community are being ignored here. This scheme has been pushed through in a lazy way that will inevitably cause problems. I remember dealing with the courts in Kerry and time after time cases on the Circuit Court lists were put back because of rushed legislation that had been challenged in the courts, causing delays. That is probably going to happen again with this.

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