Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

No. I will take a little more than two sentences but nothing excessive, I promise you, a Leas-Chathaoirligh. First, I am going to do something that is relatively unusual in this House. I will apologise and say I was wrong on one point. I acknowledge that the Minister of State is correct because I now understand what he was saying about the purpose of the section. What I was clearly proposing here was the insertion of a new section 5, thereby renumbering all succeeding sections. Therefore, the Minister of State's question about that issue appears to have been, since we are at this point speaking on section 4, why should I speak on the insertion of a new section 5? In answer to that, while I apologise and say he is absolutely right on that point, I would follow on from his point in saying that what I should then do is speak to section 5 and suggest that we should not accept section 5 because the section 5 we should accept should be my proposed section 5. I am not sure a whole lot rides on the Minister of State's intervention if he thinks about the implications of what he has said. I grant that he is literally correct but, as I said, the implications of what he has said suggest that it is something of an absurdity, although he was literally correct.

I wish to note something else in passing. The Minister of State is a bright man, and I have no doubt that he has his own views on the artists' exemption, but he did not come here today entirely unprepared or unbriefed on the subject. That makes its own point about the farcical nature of the exclusions under the-----