David Norris (Independent)

Probably one of the most important reports to be published is that of Geoffrey Shannon on the rights of children in care. I am not unique as many in the House have raised individual questions and questions on the general picture during the past several sessions of Seanad Éireann. Mr. Shannon and his colleagues have joined up the lines and they have shown a systematic violation of the human rights of very vulnerable children who have been exposed to difficulties in their family situations. It is not an easy situation to address and I do not believe that we should necessarily point the finger at particular case workers. That would be unfair. They are over-stressed and the whole area of children has been under-financed and under-resourced.

My concern is that the costings for this exercise, if we are to fully implement the recommendations, would amount to €20 million and given the economic situation I do not foresee that materialising. I see it fizzling out once again just as the financing of the guardian ad litem legislation for which this House was responsible, to a certain extent fizzled out through lack of resourcing. Perhaps the Leader will convey our concern that the report will not simply be shelved like so many reports but that it will be acted upon.

This is an area where the House plays a significant and important role. We have the opportunity, the time and the lack of partisanship whereby we can debate these issues in the interests of the most vulnerable sections of our society, unlike the other House which is charged with more directly political matters. This is yet another argument for the continuation of the House, as was the very honourable exercise of conscience by three Members who voted against the Whip. That was highly unusual and I salute those people who had such courage. I hope they will not be severely disciplined for it. During the debate yesterday it was interesting to hear people on both sides suggest that in Seanad Éireann there should be a lack of or at least a relaxing of the Whip in order that people could vote on conscience. In many instances people would vote against what I might see as the right thing to do but I have this right and I would like to see it extended to my party colleagues.

I support the remarks of Senator O'Brien on the pyrite situation. I am aware of situations where people were sold local authority houses under the affordable housing scheme. They then discovered that the houses were not properly examined to determine if they were safe and now we know they are not safe. Do these people have any recourse? The local authorities seem to be washing their hands of this issue and it is completely and absolutely wrong.

Finally, I strongly support the remarks of Senator O'Brien on the closure of Garda stations. The community should be involved and the truth should be told. In my area we were deliberately lied to. We were told that Fitzgibbon Street Garda station was being closed for refurbishment. That was not true. We took action as a united community and now at least we have a vestigial presence there and we are going to push to have proper policing in our area because it is so significant in these difficult times. This has been highlighted by the tragic situation where a young boy in a very pleasant County Wicklow town had four of his fingers blown off by picking up a bomb. This was a five year old child whose mother was behind him with another child in her arms. He picked up a pipe bomb and had five fingers blown off. That is intolerable. We need proper policing.