Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)

It is important we are addressing this issue on the first week back, especially after the summer we have had, which saw communities, particularly the Indian and southeast Asian communities, targeted for both verbal and physical assaults in a number of locations across the country. I represent Dublin West, which is an extremely vibrant, extremely diverse part of Dublin and one where we have communities from many different countries. Over the course of the summer I had the opportunity through canvassing and local events to talk to people specifically from the Indian and south Asian communities and hear of their experiences. While they remain committed to Ireland, feel welcome and feel part of this society, everyone I spoke to reported increased levels of verbal abuse in terms of what they experienced themselves and what their children and family members experienced as they travel around. An email I received from a constituent particularly struck me. It was from a woman here from Pakistan. Her partner is Irish and the pair of them were walking to Coolmine train station one day, hand in hand, when a gang of young lads spotted them and started to use various racial slurs. She is from Pakistan and we can all guess what exactly was said. What struck me most about her email was she was not surprised. This has become normalised for her. She had baked this sort of experience in. Overt racism is now a regular experience for this woman.

That represents a change in Irish society. There has always been racism in Ireland but I do not think 15 years ago people would have been as blatant as to just corner someone walking in the street and start this sort of racist abuse. There has been a change and the online space is a major driver of that change. The hateful rhetoric we see people being bombarded with is a key part of driving this change. A Cheann Comhairle, you opened the Dáil yesterday talking about what we need to do there and I welcome your initiative. We need to look strongly at the recommender systems these online platforms use. This is not about restricting free speech as this material will still be available online. People can still search for it and decide if they want to turn the algorithm on so they receive this material. It is not, therefore, about limiting free speech but about giving people freedom of choice in the content that arrives in their feed. I would hope that when we talk about this issue we can look at these recommender systems and at turning them off.

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