Ivana Bacik (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I add my voice to that of Senator van Turnhout and others to say how delighted I am to see the Bill pass Report Stage in the Seanad. I am also delighted that the Minister introduced the Bill as a Seanad Bill. I thank the Minister and commend her on her great work on the Bill and on bringing forward such a comprehensive and ground-breaking piece of reform. In particular, I thank her hard-working officials who have been so patient with us during the long process of the Bill. They helped us so much with numerous queries. I thank them all very much.

The Bill is ground-breaking in many ways. It provides for comprehensive reform of the law on sexual exploitation of children, incest and prostitution, and also introduces some very important evidential changes which will provide great support for victims and complainants, particularly for child witnesses in sex offence trials. Many of the measures in section 31 are going to be really significant and important in practice, especially for child witnesses, in addition to the provisions on disclosure that we debated so much as well.

In terms of the change to prostitution law in section 20, that has had a long journey from when the Independent Senators tabled the original motion in this House in 2012, through our work on the justice committee and our report in 2013, in addition to all the public debate around it. I commend the Minister on her introduction of the Bill. It will make a real difference in terms of the law on prostitution to see for the first time the decriminalisation of sellers and the criminalisation of buyers of sex. I welcome the considerable work of civil society groups on that law reform in particular - groups such as Ruhama, the Immigrant Council of Ireland and the Turn off the Red Light campaign. I also commend the many other groups who worked on that reform and on the important reforms for victims and complainants, particularly the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, Rape Crisis Network Ireland and various groups of counsellors who all helped us so much and gave their input on the Bill.

All of us who support the Bill will very much hope that it will see passage through the Dáil in the limited time available to the Government. I know the Minister will do all she can and we will do anything we can to help secure the Bill's passage, because the reforms it provides for are so important. As the Minister said, the Bill is ground-breaking, comprehensive and of such significance that it is vital that we see it passed in the next week or so.