Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House. We in the Labour Party very much welcome this motion. Picking up on Senator Boylan's comments on the timing of the debate, we know the deadline is 1 November for opting into this security directive. It is a little uncomfortable being so close to that date, and we have seen this rushed through both Houses of the Oireachtas within 48 hours. Again, we would like to see more time being allocated to really important developments like this.

Speaking to the directive, as everybody has said, it makes absolute sense to have a centralised register and there should be no administrative hurdles in the way of our police force in it trying to combat financial crime across Europe. An Garda Síochána and the Criminal Assets Bureau, CAB, should not be beholden to national borders. I am sure many Members saw the article a number of days ago in The Irish Timesabout 50 young persons being identified as recruited to be money mules. There are consequences for those young people, who in a variety of circumstances we can only imagine, have allowed themselves to be duped into effectively processing money illegally for an international crime gang. They will, of course, suffer the consequences and live with them for a long time.

The important issue is to get to the top of those gangs so they are not allowed to prosper and continue. We must strengthen the tools used in policing and investigating those gangs. We very much support this motion and our opting into the directive. We would like to have more time to discuss these very important EU directives in future.