Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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702. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if hate crime will be a stand-alone criminal offence under her new proposals; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [45161/20]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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As you are aware, I recently announced my intention to bring forward new legislation to combat incitement to hatred and hate crime in Ireland. This announcement followed on from the publication of the results of a widespread consultation process, which included in-depth consultations with various civil society and community groups, academics and experts, a public consultation process and a detailed comparative study of approaches to hate crime in 5 other jurisdictions.

The purpose of this extensive work was to ensure the Department could identify how Ireland’s law in this area could be improved, based on a clear understanding the experiences of those impacted by hate speech and hate crime.

The report is published on my Department's website and sets out ten conclusions which will be used to inform the new legislation:

1. The 1989 Act should be replaced with a single piece of legislation to cover both hate speech and hate crime

2. The list of protected characteristics should be updated to include disability and gender.

3. The Travelling community should be included in the main definition of ethnicity.

4. Deliberately or recklessly inciting hatred against a person or group because they are associated with a protected characteristic should be a crime, and distributing or displaying material that incites hatred should be a crime.

5. Strong safeguards will be needed to protect freedom of expression, so that genuine, reasonable contributions to fields such as literature, art, political discussion, science or academic discussion will not be criminalised.

6. The threshold for criminal prosecution under the new law should be high, but not impossible.

7. Companies who have effective measures in place to deal with criminal hate speech, and who are applying those measures properly, should not be prosecuted for content that they could not have known was being shared on their platform.

8. There is a need for new specific, hate-aggravated versions of existing criminal offences.

9. Extra measures such as alternative verdicts will be needed to make sure hate offences can be prosecuted effectively.

10. Not every hate incident is serious enough to be a crime, many incidents can and should be dealt with by other means than criminal prosecution

The new legislation will provide the necessary means to prosecute perpetrators who deliberately or recklessly incite hatred against others on the basis of a protected characteristic and will ensure that incidences of hate crime in our communities can be managed effectively by law. The new legislation will provide for specific, hate-aggravated versions of existing criminal offences.

It is my intention to bring the General Scheme of this Bill to Government before Easter, and once it is approved, to refer the Bill to the Oireachtas Justice Committee for pre-legislative scrutiny.