Dan Boyle (Green Party)

Most of the public disquiet about the recent case arose because while the Government did not ask the Ó Cuanacháins to pay the State's legal costs as well, which a court decision would have allowed it to do, the fact that the Ó Cuanacháins' side of those costs alone cost approximately €2 million says something about the cost of judicial action in the first instance.

On the need for people to seek judicial address that has not been properly provided through legislation, prior to the coming into Government of my party, the last Dáil and Seanad passed three pieces of legislation on disability — the Disability Bill, the Education of People with Special Educational Needs Bill and the Citizens Information Bill. Taken together, that tranche of legislation was meant to address many of the ongoing issues.

It has been mentioned in the House on the Order of Business and in contributions to this debate that one element of that, the Education of Persons with Special Educational Needs Act, requires several of its provisions to come into being by the making of ministerial orders. In terms of progressing this issue, that is something on which we should speak with one voice. If the legislative will has been given already by the Dáil and the Seanad, there should be no further reason to delay the making of those provisions, and I would encourage the Minister to do so.

I encourage the Minister and all our Cabinet colleagues — two of my party colleagues are now members of the Cabinet — to avoid in every circumstance, regardless of the advice being offered by civil servants in their Departments, the use of judicial action in terms of people seeking what should be natural rights that are not properly defined either in our Constitution or in our laws. That may be unavoidable on occasions but too often in the past it appears to have been used as a weapon of first resort.