Paul Bradford (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Indeed, there are certainly a few political Klingons, but the Senator is coming our way and need not worry. Obviously, cybercrime must be tackled with modern resources and I welcome the progress that will be made in that regard.

The data protection side of the issue will cause a certain amount of concern to a number of persons. Data protection is a sensitive area. All of us would like to think that any information retained about ourselves would be kept safely and securely and would be deleted and disposed of as soon as it serves no useful purpose to any agency. It is a question of balance. In a perfectly libertarian society where everybody is entitled to do what he or she wishes within the law, and to be as removed as one possibly can be from regulation and monitoring, and Big Brother, the question of data protection and data retention would not arise, but we need such data retention from the point of view of knowing who are the major threats, be they groups, organisations or individuals. The Europol arrangement probably strikes a fair balance between the rights of the citizen to have his or her details protected insofar as possible and the obligations of states and security forces to have access to the sort of information which they require to tackle crime.

I welcome the Bill. It will put in place strengthened regulation. We must welcome any regulation which will result in one less illegal cigarette being sold, one less illegal litre of diesel being sold, one gram less of illegal drugs on the streets of Dublin and one less unfortunate person being trafficked across the State or the states of Europe, and gift the resources to ensure it will be done. The Bill was passed by the other House with ease and I am sure it be similar here. I wish the Minister, Deputy Shatter, well in his deliberations on the matter.