Maurice Hayes (Independent)

I, too, wish to join the queue of support for a debate on fisheries and the marine. I also support Senator Norris in his request for a debate on decommissioning. We can get hung up on weapons and decommissioning. The more important items to decommission are the beatings because they are the things that impinge on ordinary people. I am sure Senator Norris will be pleased to know that it would cheer up James Joyce to know that Luas is an anagram for slua. Will the Leader ask the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform when it will be possible to hear the report of the three people appointed to investigate allegations emanating from the police ombudsman's office in Belfast about complicity, bombing and intelligence? If these allegations are unfounded, as I believe them to be, they should be scotched as quickly as possible and brought into the open.

As a shop steward for retired ombudsmen, I support the report of the Ombudsman. He is an officer of Parliament and the Oireachtas and we should back him. From my experience I am aware that in the British system there was a committee to which the ombudsman presented his or her report. Departments were called to appear before it and it had a wonderfully modifying effect on their behaviour. This is an unprecedented report, not the ordinary annual report of the Ombudsman. It is the first or perhaps second time that an Ombudsman has found it necessary to make a special report to the Oireachtas and we should take it seriously. I ask the Leader to find the means by which a joint committee could examine it and ensure the people concerned get justice, to which they are entitled.