Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

During the Seanad Committee and Report Stage debates on the Bill, a number of Senators indicated they considered the provision that prohibits broadcasters and providers of video on-demand services making available programmes which may reasonably be considered to cause harm or offence as being potentially contrary to the principles of freedom of expression. At that stage, I committed to examining the matter. Having examined and considered the matter, I brought amendments on the Dáil Committee Stage to qualify the standard applied to broadcasters and providers of video on-demand services from "offence" to one of "undue offence". This aligns the language in the Bill with the standard of harm or undue offence to material applied by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland through its code of programme standards, ensuring the statutory provisions align with the practical implementation of the prohibition.