Brendan Ryan (Labour)

I agree with my colleagues on the Immigration Bill. No amount of talk of reforming the Oireachtas will have any meaning if this scale of legislative gazumping can be imposed on us without proper debate. These amendments will be subject to a truncated debate in the other House and we will have to discuss them as one in this House, even though, as I understand it, they represent multiple pages of an increase in the size of the Bill. I am concerned about the Bill and the way in which this House deals with amendments to legislation made in the other House. That second debate, however, can be conducted in another forum.

I am proposing an amendment to the Order of Business – that No. 6 on the list of papers laid before the Seanad in today's Order Paper be discussed first. This paper deals with the Freedom of Information Act 1997 (Fees) Regulations 2003. We are now in the extraordinary position where to appeal a decision of a Department, citizens will have to pay one of the highest charges in the developed world. If I seek information under the Freedom of Information Act, I now have to pay €15. That is affordable, no matter what my opinion about such a charge is. If a junior civil servant refuses that request, I then have to pay €75 to have a senior civil servant to review that decision. If the senior civil servant refuses the request, I then have to pay €140 to appeal to the Information Commissioner. In a week where we have been deprived of access to the correspondence between Mr. Justice Flood and the Government because of the filleting of the Freedom of Information Act, it is adding insult to injury to introduce a system of fees. I propose that this item be taken first today because it is a matter of considerable importance.

Last week the European Union signed an extradition agreement with the United States. I do not remember voting on any EU treaty which conferred that right on the European Union but no doubt it was done at Intergovernmental Council level. One of the consequences of that agreement is to facilitate US-EU police co-operation. I did not know the European Union had a police force and would like the Government to tell the House what this means. We did not agree in any treaty to an EU-wide police force. It is extraordinary that the European Union will have a level of co-operation with US police forces greater than the co-operation between police forces within the Union.