Malcolm Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I, too, welcome Cara Hunter to the Gallery. Yesterday, she spoke profoundly on RTÉ radio in respect of her experience of online abuse during an election campaign. In these Houses last week we launched a report in respect of the abuse of referees, match officials and others involved in sport. Yesterday, Ursula Jacob who, as Members will be aware, is an All-Ireland camogie medal winner for Wexford, a commentator and a person with great experience of sport, became the latest person in the public eye to have to speak out against the online abuse, anonymous and otherwise, she has experienced. I am conscious that the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill will be back before the House next week. There are measures that need to be taken in that context but this House needs to discuss calling on the social media platforms to do a lot more. Not enough is being done to tackle online abuse. It should not be the case that, every week, individuals in the public eye and, in many cases, people who are not in the public eye, have to suffer levels of online abuse. We will certainly show our continued solidarity with Ursula Jacob and all other victims of anonymous online abuse.

I regularly raise in the House the issue of foreign births registration. There have been ongoing problems relating to the Passport Office. The problem with foreign birth registrations, however, is not improving. The Department of Foreign Affairs has now reached applications that were submitted in January 2020. A person applying now for a foreign birth registration will have to wait more than 30 months before his or her application is considered. That is not acceptable. I again ask that we have a specific debate on the issue of foreign birth registrations and that the Leader write to the Minister on behalf of Senators to express our concern.