Lynn Ruane (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I hope we can work together to look at the substantive issues here. I do not think anyone is arguing in favour of covering up or turning a blind eye to illegal dumping or against the value of a clean space. To argue for these amendments is not to argue against that. This is about how to create a society that finds a way to reduce that while also not having a negative impact on other communities that may be inadvertently impacted by someone else's behaviour, which has nothing to do with them, even with the safeguards in place. The Minister of State is saying the safeguards are there with regard to facial recognition. There are things defined in the legislation but there is no reference to them in the rest of the Bill. Why would something be defined within the legislation at all if is not going to be used? I do not understand why that would be in the legislation in the first place. My fear is that, while there is limited scope in this Bill around the definitions and giving powers to chief executives to make decisions on applications for CCTV, it will set a precedent. When it comes to technology and setting precedent in any legislation, we need to make sure we are thinking of future legislation and how this legislation can be used or abused to create other avenues for local authorities to give licences and stuff for whatever they want. A local community could claim illegal dumping is happening somewhere but it might be relatively small. Some chief executive would then come under local pressure from councillors and decide to put CCTV there. There would be no checks or balances on that. There would also be no notices to the public that it is there in the first place.

I live at the foot of the Dublin Mountains. I drive and walk up around Kiltipper Hill and I see the dumping that happens there. It is also very close to a working-class community that struggles to pay for its waste and refuse. People there struggle to buy extra bins. Poverty sometimes creates some of those sites. I am not talking about those at the large scale the Minister of State is talking about in the countryside. Within communities there may be local councillors who want to be seen to be doing something about what is a relatively small issue and is actually a result of poverty. That is why we need to make sure a chief executive does not have the power to make those decisions. There must be an understanding about why an issue might be happening. In some cases people are not criminals making money from this; people are struggling. There are people in my community who burn their rubbish out the back, with black smoke coming up in the middle of housing estates. That is where these issues intersect. There have to be safeguards when it comes to technology to protect communities that are acting out of poverty and not to make a profit.