Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 9:

In page 45, between lines 3 and 4, to insert the following: “(3) The Commission shall ensure that fees for different classes of application or review request are not prohibitive.”.

This is a fairly straightforward amendment. I would probably say that all of mine are. We had this discussion on Committee Stage. Nobody wants to see a situation where people who have the ability to be vetted researchers or trusted flaggers cannot do so because the cost is prohibitive. The Minister of State gave me some assurances on Committee Stage and I would appreciate those to be put on the record of the House. Again, this is around ensuring the legislation is every bit as good as it can be. Any fees charged should only be to barely cover administration costs. I have concerns about any barrier that is put in place for these people. They are being entrusted with a very serious job. I understand the trusted flaggers will not be the arbiter of illegal content, as the Minister of State has said. I get that but it is still a position of power and is an important one. Ensuring a broad range is very important and if the barrier is high - I am not suggesting the Minister of State will place the barrier necessarily high but the fact is subsequent Ministers may choose to do that - it is favouring those with deep pockets and excluding those who perhaps have if not a huge contribution, then an important contribution to make but perhaps do not have the shillings to be able to get over the bar of the fees. Again, the Minister of State gave some assurances on Committee Stage. I would like to hear those assurances again and perhaps he might elaborate on them.

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