Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The definition of a protected person in section 21 is "a person [who] lacks the capacity to consent to a sexual act [because] he or she is, by reason of a mental or intellectual disability or a mental illness, incapable of - (a) understanding the nature, or the reasonably foreseeable consequences, of that act, (b) evaluating relevant information for the purposes of deciding whether or not to engage in that act, or (c) communicating his or her consent to that act by speech, sign language or otherwise". That is the definition of a person protected by the general law, whereas the person protected by the special law for imposing a criminal liability on persons in authority is "a person who [suffers from] - (a) a mental or intellectual disability, or (b) a mental illness, which is of such a nature or degree as to severely restrict the ability of the person to guard himself or herself against serious exploitation". I cannot see for the life of me why there are different definitions of protection and of mental incapacity, which attract on the one hand one set of protections for persons in authority and, on the other, attract different protections for people who are protected persons for the purpose of section 21(7).