Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

I acknowledge the fact that this arises from discussion in the course of Committee Stage debate on this section. At that stage it was suggested by Senator Ryan that it had never been the practice to authorise gardaí to prosecute summary offences because they have that authority in common law. The provision was without drafting precedent and accordingly it was proposed that the reference to a member of the Garda Síochána in this section should be removed. Having checked this, the Government allowed this amendment to take account of the point raised by Senator Ryan. I thank the Senator for bringing this to my attention.