Ivana Bacik (Independent)

I did not think I would have an opportunity to speak.

I want to ask the Leader for a debate on censorship and freedom of expression, not in the context of the debate we have been having recently about the Government's gross over-reaction to the satirical portrait of the Taoiseach, although I share the concern of many about the heavy-handed tactics of the Garda Síochána in investigating where no criminal offence, it seems to me, had been made out.

I want to ask for a debate on a different aspect of censorship, one of growing concern to a large number of people in this country, although it has gone under the radar politically, that is the censorship imposed by Internet service providers on their customers, even when they are accessing websites that are not illegal and not in the context of any criminal offence. This is in the wake of a High Court case which was settled in January in which Eircom agreed to take the e-mail addresses of its subscribers from record companies which alleged that those subscribers had been accessing certain websites where they could download music. Eircom agreed to do this on the basis of a "three strikes and you are out" principle, whereby it would remove its subscribers from their subscription thereby ending their Internet access if they were found to be accessing certain sites. There is much concern about this and last week the European Parliament adopted by an enormous majority a report rejecting this sort of surveillance and the idea that there should be penalties for this sort of thing. In the context of what we saw with Google in China, we must be very wary of the sort of censorship Internet service providers are being asked or in some cases are agreeing to impose on their subscribers. I ask for a debate on this important topic.

I welcome the Lancet's debunking of the Pope's outrageous claim that condoms do not prevent the transmission of HIV worldwide. It is important that claim is debunked. The Pope did not even have the excuse of April fool's day in making what was a very serious false claim.