Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy David Stanton. This is a very good proposal from Senator Michael McDowell and the Government will not be opposing it on Second Stage. There will always be an opportunity to enhance and improve it on Committee Stage. I encourage Members who have a viewpoint that will enhance what has been proposed to engage in the process. It makes absolute sense. Senator Michael McDowell has significant experience and knowledge which are of huge benefit to the Houses of the Oireachtas. Every day we see examples which prove the benefit of Seanad Éireann and this Bill is one such example. In the last Seanad I proposed a motion which called on the Government to embrace the principle of e-conveyancing, which is different from what is being proposed. When somebody purchases a house, the conveyancing process can take a number of weeks to complete. If it was electronic, it would cut the time involved by 80% to 90%. When the Minister of State was Chairman of the Joint Committee on Justice and Equality, this was an issue we examined. Similarly, in the case of wills taking out probate takes far too long. The process is cumbersome and time consuming, which leads to significant extra costs. The principle of limiting costs as outlined by Senator Michael McDowell is of great importance. If passed, the Bill will certainly deal with that issue. We also need to look at streamlining to ensure the taking out of probate will happen in a timely manner. When nothing is being contested and everything is kosher and agreed to, the time gap is still completely unacceptable.

The registering of wills proposed by others in the House is something with which I absolutely agree. It is ridiculous that one has to advertise to establish whether there is a will. I would say 90%, if not 95%, of wills are now drawn up through a solicitor. Establishing such a register with 95% accuracy is possible. I suggest to the Minister of State that we need to look at the issue of probate and bring the process into the 21st century. We need to embrace e-conveyancing and provide the necessary funding in collaboration with the Law Society of Ireland which is a big proponent of the idea. We need to reduce dramatically the length of time it takes to take out probate, especially when a will is uncontested. We certainly need to implement what is proposed in the Bill in the case of contested wills.

I commend the Bill and look forward to hearing the Minister of State's response.