Results 19,401-19,420 of 29,533 for speaker:Brendan Howlin
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: We are not doing it for ourselves, Senator. We are-----
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Or anything else. Marital status, trade union membership-----
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: I thought Senator Norris would have been on my side on this issue. I will first deal with the concerns expressed by Senator Quinn and those expressed on behalf of the Genealogical Society of Ireland by Senator Quinn. I can categorically reassure the Senator that there is no reclassification of what constitutes personal information in this Bill. The definition of personal information in the...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Senator Norris should talk to the trade union movement if he does not understand the point.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Many people have been shut out, sacked, fired and discriminated against because of their trade union membership.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: These are the types of personal information in question. The idea of FOI is not that anyone can have a prurient trawl of everyone else's data. The purpose is to have information important to the public discourse available in public; it is not to have everything known about people available. Let us consider the things that are excluded. Information on the medical, psychiatric or...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: -----and set 20 civil servants to work, that would not be the intended use of the provisions. People will not be excluded from doing normal trawls, but we should not embed that as a central function of the Bill. All the records covered by the Acts are available for FOI requests, subject to the legislative protections in respect of personal information to which I have referred. There is...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: The proposal would broaden the scope of the FOI mechanism beyond its intention. It is simply a mechanism to provide information to people. Nowadays it would be quite improper to ask a job applicant about his or her marital status or whether he or she is a member of a trade union. Certainly in the public service, one would not be allowed to ask. One is not allowed to make decisions on the...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: I thank the Senator again. Local authorities are established under legislation and therefore comply with the definition of "public body" in section 6(1)(b) of the Bill. In any event, section 6(1)(h) provides that anybody already subject to FOI under the 1997 Act will remain subject to it under this legislation. Therefore, they are caught twice, to be doubly sure. On that basis, I do not...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Amendments Nos. 9 and 24 relate to the Office of the President. An amendment along these lines was tabled in the Dáil and I gave it very careful consideration. Reflecting the constitutional provisions on the President, it has always been accepted that the President and the Office of the President are beyond the normal fray and to and fro of politics. The tradition, both in this House...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: It is subject to normal accountability procedures.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: I will deal with Senator Sean D. Barrett's concerns first. He has not said anything with which I do not fully and completely agree. I am afraid that there was a deliberate policy which had nothing to do with the Central Bank of light touch regulation that disempowered proper supervision for a long period. These matters will be investigated in a different fora and we will see what...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: More than 100,000 people work in the health system.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: He or she is exempt from FOI but is answerable to the Comptroller and Auditor General and the PAC and accountable for the expenditure of every cent to the Dáil in a transparent way.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Yes but he is the Secretary General to the President-----
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: I have explained this in detail. The Senator knows my views full well. The only net point he is raising is accountability in terms of expenditure. That is fully transparent and accountable through the formal financial controls over any Vote. A tiny group of people works in the Office of the President. It is not right to compare its expenditure to the billions of euro expended by the...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Senator Quinn has raised an important issue - the right to redress by a member of the public if a public body fails to fulfil an obligation, in this case concerning publication of information. I considered whether this provision should be maintained in making an amendment to the Bill in the Dáil to specify key information that would be required for inclusion in a publication scheme....
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: I share the objective of Senators Quinn and Barrett in amendments Nos. 20 and 28 in respect of ensuring good records management. The issue was considered in depth during the review of FOI legislation carried out by both an internal group of public bodies and an external group composed of academics, journalists and representative groups while the Bill was being drafted. The external group's...
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: Private companies are not subject to freedom of information legislation.
- Seanad: Freedom of Information Bill 2013: Committee Stage (25 Sep 2014)
Brendan Howlin: It was not.