Brendan Ryan (Labour)

This House has stood firmly behind the family and friends of the late Robert McCartney. Yesterday it was stated on RTE that the family insisted Mr. McCartney was killed by the Provisional IRA. Today it was stated on RTE that Mr. McCartney was alleged to have been killed by members of the Provisional IRA. Robert McCartney was murdered by members of the IRA. It is not an allegation made on the insistence of the family, it is a fact. I have no idea why our national broadcaster appears to want to dilute that fact by putting it the way it has done. Is it that it thinks the IRA will sue it for libel? There is no need for this. No person has been named. I will not say I find this dilution of that most offensive crime sinister, but it is a sloppy use of language by our national broadcaster.

There was another leak from Sellafield which we did not hear about until recently. As a sometime engineer, part of the report horrified me. It states, "The company has yet to devise a way to get the highly radioactive liquid out of the chamber." That is where it has leaked into. If those involved do not know how to get it out, they never expected it to happen. I say this with some professional competence, though I am not trying to claim expertise. If they cannot get it out, it means they never expected it to happen. How can we trust them when they say the whole thing is safe if events they never expected can happen and close down the plant for months? We need to refocus on the fact that there is no way Sellafield can be safe. It is a danger to all of us and this needs to be reiterated.

Will the Leader ask the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform to explain to this House the extraordinary refusal to publish the details of the decision-making structures and processes of the refugee appeals body? All of its appeal outcomes are secret. We do not know how individual members of that body make their decisions. We do not know whether some of them accept 75% of the appeals or others reject 95%. This is entirely unacceptable. One cannot have a quasi-judicial body making such fundamental decisions in secret. When other people do that type of thing we get extremely annoyed, and quite rightly. The Minister should discuss yet again with this House the whole issue of the secrecy involved in the process of deciding who may or may not live here and how decisions are taken to deport people from the country.