Brendan Ryan (Labour)

On values, I reiterate what Senator O'Toole said. Something horrible and brutal happened yesterday and, as he said very eloquently, it will be an icon for the future. We need to take a leadership role in this regard, to have the international democratic community say that any society which claims to be democratic but reserves to itself the right to execute anybody it does not like is no longer fit to be classified in the company of democratic societies. Unless the democratic world says that, we are giving a rationale to terrorism for which all democratic societies will pay a price. We have to realise that democracy is based on the rule of law; it is not mob rule. I call on the Leader to arrange a debate on the fundamental issue of what we mean by democratic states and democratic society because what happened yesterday was an affront to every democratic value.