Donie Cassidy (Fianna Fail)

Senator Keaveney spoke about party pills. The party pill Bill will be introduced in the next session. In addition, with regard to the debate on alcohol, I encourage young people and those partaking of alcohol over the Christmas season to respect it for the drug that it is. I would like to see everyone enjoying themselves and having a good time, but we should respect alcohol as it is a drug. With regard to the points made by Senators Norris and Bacik, I apologise to Senator Norris as I understood he had been contacted, but I will correct that after the Order of Business. I gave him my word in that regard.

Senator Norris had some other queries about the Equality Authority. There were 43 employees in the Equality Authority and that number has been reduced by five, or 11%, to 38. A good service will still be given by the excellent——