James Bannon (Fine Gael)

I am disappointed because the amendments are straightforward. As I said, the first one is a very necessary amendment. It makes it a requirement for a court order to be issued before a building society can become a public limited company. That is it in a nutshell. To improve the legislation it is important that this should be included in the Bill.

As regards the second amendment, it is important that we detail the powers and duties of the court in making the order. It is only right that this should be done. It will definitely improve the legislation and it is something the Minister of State should consider taking on board.

I had tabled approximately 131 amendments to the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Bill which came before the House earlier today. A good number of them were not taken in this House although, as Senator Brady is aware, one was taken. When the Bill came back from the Dáil today we discovered that 45 of the amendments we put forward in this House three weeks ago had been accepted. The Bill had to be returned to this House on that basis.

These amendments are worthy of consideration. I believe that rushed legislation is bad legislation. If the Minister of State had tonight, tomorrow or the weekend to think about this, I believe he would be taking the amendments on board. I again plead with him to consider accepting the amendments as they would very much improve the legislation.