Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister is welcome. Like my colleague, Senator McDowell, I have serious reservations about legislation coming to this House and going through all Stages in two hours. This demonstrates a complete lack of respect for the democratic process and the function and role of this House. It is an emergency and, bearing that in mind, I am prepared to go for it.

I cannot understand why we have not and are not considering putting checkpoints on the Border. If we restrict travel into the country through Dublin, Cork and the various ports, we must also ensure that the same restrictions apply on the Border if the exact same systems are not in place in the North of Ireland. The misinformation that has been spoken of led to what we saw on Saturday, which was the lunatic brigade picking on every minute detail coming from any Minister's office in order to introduce confusion into the public sphere. We should discourage people from travelling at all. Anybody who wants to travel into the country should have to go through one of our embassies and produce a test to say that he or she is clear of Covid-19 before evening thinking about boarding a plane. A person should not be able to get on a plane without a certificate in his or her hand.

A garda said to me the other day that if somebody arriving at an airport is told that he or she has to go into quarantine, as the provisions of this Bill are not yet in place, the person does not have to bother and can go home. Garda representatives have still not met the Minister for Justice to explain their concerns and have her answer them. I ask the Minister to impress on the Minister for Justice that she should meet representatives from the Garda Representative Association, the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors and Garda superintendents straight away. I thank the Cathaoirleach for the extra time.