Martin Kenny
Sligo-Leitrim · Sinn Féin · Ireland
“A debate here for a couple of hours is fine, but I remember being involved in some of the deep talks with people in the early days of the peace process. We sat in rooms and talked about reconciliation. I met Garret FitzGerald on many occasions at the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation.”
“Of course, we have the areas of natural constraint payments that most farmers on this side of the Border avail of. Unfortunately, those payments are no longer available in the North. Sinn Féin has recommended that the payments should be restored. Farmers need support. Brexit took their support away.”
“I welcome this debate. Such a debate has been needed for quite a long time. The reality is that for many people, the issue of the financial implications of Irish unity has been used as a put-down to try to smother or put a stop to argument and debate. This is a welcome way in which we can open that up.”
“I hope Government will reflect on that and recognise that we need to build a process. There is an energy for reunification among ordinary people the length and breadth of the country. This is about the physical constraints, but is also about identity. Many people who live on this island have a British identity.”
“As the Taoiseach is aware, for many years people with mental health issues have been attending emergency departments in our hospitals. Many of them get very poor outcomes. They experience long delays and end up on trolleys. Sometimes they are referred for short-term stays or to community services, which offer little or no service.”
“I appreciate all that and the farmers forum is a positive advancement on things, but we are back to the problem at the very core of this issue, which is that the chair of Bord Bia has been using imported beef from Brazil as part of his mix to sell product.”
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“Deputy Mac Lochlainn spoke about the "big five" and the big corporations that are out there, which have such power. They seem to have more power than countries and certainly seem to have more power than Ireland. That seems to be what the outcome of this is. We also have to recognise that their role in all this has brought us to where we are. It is these very corporations and their greed, where they put out these massive, big factory ships and absolutely decimate our waters. They just suck up everything and destroy the fishing beds and everything for the future. They are the ones that have caused the stock crisis and environmental crisis, but we now find ourselves in the position that the European Union is trying to salvage the situation and the very ones that destroyed it are the ones being rewarded for it.”
“We need to get back to sustaining the family farm and putting measures in place. If the farmer is profitable and making money the rural economy is vibrant. The small towns are doing well. At the moment, we need to ensure that happens. The Government must use the resources, possibility and energy of government to sustain that model into the future. That is why we ask the Minister of State to look again at this proposal we put forward this evening. It is obviously not going to go anywhere tonight. The Government should look at it again and come back to it in the future. It can put its own label on it if it wants to. I do not care but it must do something for the small people who need a future in the small family farms the length and breadth of the country.”
“The ordinary people who want a future in small towns and villages the length and breadth of this country do not see the boom in agriculture going back to provide a future for them. The Government put forward its amendment. That is fine. That is what governments do when they are in power but they have to be responsible to the people who put them there as well. Whatever differences we have politically, the Minister of State has to understand. He also comes from a rural part of County Galway. Many people in that area and in his county want a future in agriculture. That is why this Government needs to put a focus on maintaining and sustaining the family farm model into the future, and not allow it to go down this direction, which it clearly is, where it will be about the boardroom.”
“It is depending on the people in the rural community for the seven to ten miles around it to come in to buy their shopping, do whatever they are doing, and the mart is the central part of that. If we continue to go down this route where farmers will have to get bigger and there will be less of them, it will eventually become a corporate model, and we will end up in a situation where we see whole communities left behind. People will say no-one shouted, "Stop." That is the opportunity we are saying is here. The Government can bury its head in the sand and say it is doing great because the guys around the boardroom says it is doing well. For the ordinary people on the ground, we are not doing well.”
“If people open their eyes they will see it is not working. It is not working for the small family farms around the country that are practically on their knees. In my county of Leitrim there are five cattle marts, which is unusual, because with so many of the cattle the weanlings are sold. We used to say the big farmers from the midlands and the south came up and bought them and brought them off to the good land and made money on them. That was the system. Many of those marts are now under pressure. In fact, one of them in the town of Mohill is talking about closing. Why is that? If you take the town of Mohill there is practically nothing else in it. There is a modular cold store factory I know many are employed in, maybe 100 or so, or maybe less. Apart from that there is nearly no other industry around it.”
“Farming becomes a corporate model. They keep buying more land and taking the opportunities and the farmer just becomes an employee of that industry. That is not a good way forward. That is not the way of the traditional agricultural sector we have in Ireland. It is going to be detrimental for the future, because when some global crisis comes that corporation is gone and all you are left with is debt. The whole lot is belly up, the same as when the building boom burst. We cannot see that happen. That is why it is so important that we get the re-emphasis back on making the family farm sustainable in the long term. That may require support from the Government, which is only for that sector, not just for the big industry. It is more than disappointing that the Government is saying that what it is doing is working.”
“We are saying there needs to be a commission that is focused on the family farm and not focused on the industry and on those who are already doing well, not comforting the comforted and the comfortable but looking after those who are taking the risk and without whom none of this would happen. Looking to that is why we feel there needs to be a focus and a listening ear to what they want, what they need, what their future communities need and what their future family needs to keep that farm sustainable and ensure that the small family farm is going to be there into the future. What will happen is what we see in some sectors. We have seen it across Europe and other parts of the world. The larger farmers and the food industry companies start taking over the farms. When they start taking over the farm, bit by bit they become the farmer.”
“The amendment put forward is looking at Food Vision 2030, CAP and all of these things as though they will be the saviour. The fact is they are not the saviour for the farmer. They are the saviour for the food processor and the retailer. That is who they are the saviour for. They are ensuring they can get a living, not the farmer. There used to be an old saying, "Wait, horse and you will get grass." That is what they used to say, and it is the same thing for this. If they wait long enough they might get a good year or two, but there are five or six bad ones. They might get another good year or two, and then they will have another row of bad ones. That is what is happening with farming. That has been the cycle up to now.”
“That is all very good. The difficulty is that they have to replant the land again. It can never go back into farming. That is the only thing it can never be used for. It is gone forever. It is a permanent change of land use. Last year, we had a storm. Around me, hundreds of thousands of trees were knocked and are gone. Many of them had only been planted for between ten and 15 years. Going in to clear those trees out it cost more than they were worth and the farmer still has to replant the land. There is that possibility of that risk for them, and that is one of the key environmental measures the Minister of State is talking about. That risk is too high for them to look at. Some still are, but many people see a huge problem in that.”
“Deputy Fitzmaurice mentioned some of these measures with regard to rewetting and climate change. There are more restrictions coming on farmers all the time to do more public good. We can debate the viability of them and all that but the ultimate viability of them is whether or not the farmer will be paid for that. The difficulty is that they do not see a future in it. They do not see themselves being paid for it, because it is all short-termism. Forestry was also mentioned in the Minister of State's opening speech. Farmers who decide to go into forestry plant the land. They get a grant to do it. After seven or eight years they get a portion where it can be thinned and the thinnings can be sold off. At the end of it they can sell off the finished timber if they get that far and they get a decent price for it. It is tax free.”
“They will tell you about international pressures and global food chains and the way everything is connected around the world. If there is a possibility of getting a portion of the product or an ingredient of the product somewhere cheaper, they will get it from there. Who suffers? It is the farmer, who takes all the risk, and the one without whom there would be none of it. We have the protests going down at Bord Bia at the moment. Only for the farmers there would be no Bord Bia. There would be nothing to market anywhere in the world. That seems to be lost on those who sit around boardroom tables but it is not lost on the farmer because they know that without them there would be nothing there. It seeks to ensure that climate and environmental measures are practical and economically viable.”
“The food regulator has been crying out for the past couple of years, since its establishment, for more resources and proper teeth to be able to deal with issues, and the Government has not provided them. The position of the farmer in the value chain is one of the key aspects of this. The farmer takes all the risk. The farmer is the one who gets up at night, makes sure the cow is calving and checks the cattle. Earlier today, I was talking to people about rural crime and farmers who have their machinery stolen and all these issues. Farmers are dealing with all these things. They are the ones taking all the risk in all of this. Then, when they sell on their product, the processor takes its margin and sells it on to the retailer, and the retailer takes its margin. However, if things go wrong and get a little tight, what happens then?”
“We know that the dairy industry in Ireland is extremely successful and doing extremely well but we need to be able to put some check in place to ensure that it does not smother out opportunity for everybody else. That is one of the things we need to do and one of the issues this commission would need to deal with. The statement refers to "orderly and fair succession". Orderly and fair succession in most cases cannot happen because farmers do not see a future for the family to be able to maintain a decent income on the farm for a second generation to be able to live on it without having off-farm income, sometimes maybe several off-farm incomes, to do that. The Minister of State mentioned "strengthening farmers" position in the value chain".”
“I was just reading through the Minister of State's list in his statement. "The work ahead is substantial", it reads. It refers to making farming "attractive to young people". The difficulty is that young people do not see a way of getting into farming because an awful lot of them cannot afford to buy the land when it comes up, if there is land beside them, or even to lease land because the bigger you are, the longer or better you survive. The very large dairy farmers are eating up any possibility for anyone else to get started. We have the same thing with tillage. The Minister of State mentioned tillage being something we needed to develop, and it is the same problem. We have one sector which is dominating.”
“If we do not do that, we will erode the very fabric on which we are exporting and modelling the markets around the world for our food and high-quality produce. I am disappointed the Government has come in with this amendment but I ask the Minister of State to please look at the opportunity that is in the legislation put before him.”
“The rural economy and rural communities survived and thrived. That is why it is important we keep the family farm as part of that and that it does not become another corporate model based on high debt. That is what they all end up being based on, and when the problems come, what happens? The whole lot is sold out and gone. The fear many people have is that the model of agriculture we have in Ireland is going down the way it has gone in other countries. We do not want to see that happen. The amendment the Minister of State will move basically says we are doing it, everything is good and we are flying. That is not people's experience. Please come back and look at what we have here. Look at the opportunity we have for people in rural communities to be sustainable into the future.”
“Obviously, the Minister of State will not support this legislation, but will he do something to maintain the livelihoods and opportunity people want to have in rural communities? It can keep them alive and sustained. I strongly emphasise the opportunities people have in rural communities to maintain the lifestyle that has held communities together down the years. The Minister of State comes from a part of the country where that can be understood. The land in Connemara is poor but the people are rich in spirit, community and resourcefulness, and they are interdependent. That comes from having to do it in the past because there was little or nothing else. When we had a recession in this country 12 years ago, everything was finished, there was nothing, building was down the Swannee and everyone was bankrupt, but farming was still there.”
“There is a crisis and Government is refusing to recognise that. That is why we are proposing this legislation. It will put a commission in place which will work with farmers and rural communities to make those communities vibrant once more. We are disappointed Government has decided to set that to one side and continue the road it is going. The road it is going has not worked and is not working. If the Minister of State is honest, he would recognise and understand that. It is not just me saying it as an Opposition spokesperson; that is what farmers throughout the country are saying. They fear for the future. They fear their children will not want to go into farming or to maintain the lifestyle of the past. That will be detrimental to rural communities - to our footballs clubs, our schools and everything.”
“When in a townland or parish there are a number of people farming on small farms, the vet is busy and the local co-op is busy selling gates, manure, fertiliser and everything to keep it going. Bit by bit, when small farmers leave the sector, all the other industries close down afterwards. To keep the rural community vibrant, we have to keep the family farm in place. To do that, there has to be an emphasis on it. The Government's proposal is basically saying, "Look, we're already doing this. Everything is great." Everything is not great. There were almost 276,000 fewer cattle in the country in summer 2025 than in summer 2024 - over a quarter of a million fewer. There were over 70,000 fewer sheep in the country in that year. That has not changed or improved since prices started to go up in the past six to nine months.”
“They would come up with recommendations within a one-year period. This would be a short period in which to come up with the recommendations. The Government would then put the recommendations into action. We are talking about something to move this forward at pace. The longer we drag our heels, the more people with small portions of lands go out of farming. Forestry is taking over in my part of the world. When forestry takes over, there is nothing left because, farm by farm, it becomes trees after trees and then there is no community and they die. The Bill will maintain the viability of the small family farm, which maintains and retains the activity of the community.”
“I have huge respect for Teagasc, the Department and much of the work they have done but, unfortunately, it has been focused on the large intensive sector farming. On the other side, and upland farmers are an example - the hill and mountain farmers - Teagasc and other organisations have done little or no research into what improvements can be done to make their farms viable. That is one example of it. The proposal we bring tonight is to set up a commission on the family farm. The Minister would appoint a chairperson and there would be ten members of the commission. They would include experts from across the field, including from agencies like Teagasc, from the Department and from industry. They would come together to focus on the family farm and how it can be protected and made viable in the long term and sustainably.”
“That is why we need to look at what we can do to make farming viable for many people. The situation with bluetongue at the moment is stifling a lot of people, particularly in the Border areas, where the market depends on buyers coming across the Border from the North. This is a difficult system to understand and to work out how to resolve. A lot of farmers in my part of the world and the west of Ireland in general lamb the ewes and calve the cows, then send them off to be fattened somewhere else. The suckler farmers are an example of that. They are finding it difficult to survive because they are small by nature. Because of the type of land they have, the farm is often broken up into parts and is not all in one area. It is difficult to come up with solutions. So far all the solutions have been driven toward the more intensive sectors.”
“Many years ago I had mushroom tunnels. They were used around the country on small farms where it was difficult to survive. They were an additional and alternative enterprise on the farm which made it more profitable and able to survive. It is much like many things in agriculture. I had five mushroom tunnels. To survive, you had to have eight, ten or 12. Today, I think there are about half a dozen mushroom growers in the country and they have dozens of tunnels. That is the way the system had to go because of the pressure. I suppose it is about economies of scale. The concept was probably developed by Teagasc way back at that time. To make the small family farm viable, you needed additional enterprise on it. Unfortunately, it became more important to develop that enterprise into an industry than to protect the family farm.”
“That is very disappointing. Government seems to have a blind spot as regards recognising many people's realities. We want to put together a small group through which farmers' representatives would come together with experts to work out a system by which we can make family farms viable for the long term. We recognise agriculture is at a crucial juncture. There are issues like Mercosur, trade deals and volatility in prices, and the way the marketing of food is going is more towards looking after the corporate sector, with less emphasis and focus on the primary producer. That is what we want to see change. We want to protect the primary producer. We want to look at the opportunities. The commission could look at harnessing those opportunities and at diversification, innovation and all the things that can happen on the small family farm.”
“We want to show the food we produce as being of the highest quality. We want most of the dairy, beef and lamb we produce to come from free-roaming, grass-fed animals on family farms where the animals are cared for and looked after by the people who own them. We use all of that as a means of marketing our produce worldwide, which we do very well. For that reason, it is important that this is real and not just a brand. To make it real, we have to ensure family farms are profitable enterprises for those who depend on them. Very many people who have a small family farm unfortunately need to have off-farm income. In some cases, they may need more than one off-farm income if they are to survive. That makes things very difficult. That is why we have brought forward this legislation tonight. I know the Government is opposing it.”
“I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time." As the Minister of State will know, across the country, the issues facing family farms are very difficult for many people involved in farming. It has been a tradition in Ireland that most people came from a family farm. The mother, the father and maybe some of the children were involved in farm activity for a major portion of their lives and perhaps all of their lives. That has always been the tradition. However, in some sectors, that has moved on. As farming has become less profitable in some ways, it has become more intensive. Farms have therefore had to become larger. This has led to the model of a corporate farm replacing that of the family farm in some cases, particularly in certain sectors. That is not good for the image Ireland wants to portray to the world.”
“We often find when we ring the Oireachtas lines to speak to people who work for the Oireachtas that they are speaking to us from home, whether it is about a social welfare issue, a tax issue or whatever. It is because they have the opportunity to it. If we are able to ensure that people who work for the Oireachtas or work for the Government can work remotely, it makes absolute sense that people in the private sector should also have the same right and that we should guarantee those rights. In that context, I absolutely support what is proposed in this legislation. Government should look at it again and realise that it is really behind the curve on all of this. The future is to ensure that workers have the flexibility and that employers also have the flexibility to be able to employ people wherever it suits them best to work.”
“The opportunity to have somebody who can work from home means that employers often do not have to get additional office space when they have to expand and grow. It is a win-win for everybody at all times. I was very disappointed to hear the Minister of State's speech. It was so negative and stuck in the past. I often meet people who, because they cannot work remotely, think nobody else should either, which is a stupid concept. It makes sense for people to be able to do it. It makes sense for the economy. It makes sense for people not just in rural areas but in urban areas as well. It takes away congestion. It offers people flexibility in their lives. It has umpteen advantages for business to allow them to grow. Many of the back-office activities can be done from somebody's home.”
“I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this Bill today. I have long been a proponent of remote working. I attended a conference in Tubbercurry in 2018 that was organised by Grow Remote. It was one of the first conferences it held about organising work in this way. It had another one the year later in Athlone. I attended both of them because I saw the opportunity that remote working offered, particularly for rural areas. As has been mentioned, many rural communities have set up hubs. There is very poor Internet in many areas despite the roll-out of broadband. The roll-out has been very hit and miss in many rural communities. These hubs offer an opportunity for people to come together and be able to work remotely. The biggest opportunity is for employers. I have spoken to many employers.”
“Until now there has been particular anxiety around the issue of the cross-Border trade, North and South. If it is possible, this is the first thing on which we need to get clarity. What negotiations will be held? What actions are going to be taken? How are we going to get this opened up again in a safe way, which is the important part of it?”
“We need to get that clear pathway as to exactly what is going to happen and what this is going to cost not just to the industry as a whole, in the context of markets, but to the individual farmer from the point of view of vaccinations. Will there be any assistance for farmers around that? That would be useful for farmers to know and understand. There are so many things out there that are causing difficulties and this is just another one that farmers are really concerned about. They see the possibility of anything else, particularly for the beef sector, having a negative knock-on impact on them as very dangerous as we move forward. I understand there are certain questions we need to get answers to and I think the Minister appreciates that. We need clarity around this. Farmers need clarity around it also.”
“When we come into the month of March, however, there could be a week or ten days of quite warm weather and we could be in a serious situation if we see this disease spreading. While many of the midges that may have brought it across originally are probably either hibernating or gone to their reward hopefully, there are others that may spread the disease if it is already latent in animals. There needs to be clarity around that because the other issue is that it can also be spread by bulls if bulls are going off to be sold. If that bull bulls a cow, the next thing is the cow has bluetongue. There are issues around testing and with animal movement.”
“We need to try to get to a stage where we can have a clear sense that everybody in the system is working together and everybody in the system is playing their part. That is why it is vitally important that we get a clear roadmap as to where it is going. First, we need full and proper testing to happen, so we can identify if there are any more problems. Second, if there are problems, how will they be dealt with and how quickly are we going to be able to get to a stage when animal movement can happen again and we can have some clarity around all of that? I welcome the statements and the fact we have a sense that we are on top of it. From the point of view of the time of year, it has been some comfort in that we can relax a little bit that it is not going to spread right now.”
“If that is going to be required, are the vaccines in stock? How is that going to be managed? What implications will that have for trade? We need some clarity around all those issues. I fully respect that the Minister's Department is doing its best. I fully respect that it is doing everything it can to stay on top of it and to get information out there. Many of the farmers talking to me - I am sure they are talking to the Minister too - are saying they are at a bit of loss to know where we are going from here. What is the clear road map forward in respect of bluetongue? It comes at a time when farmers are already distressed and annoyed about lots of things, including the issue in Bord Bia and many other things, so these things do not help.”
“The Minister mentioned how the Chinese market for hides has opened up again. Of course, no sooner had the Taoiseach announced that we had reopened trade with China than this happened and now it is closed again. That is one of the issues we have. We seem to be in a particular position with China and the Chinese market, which is massive. They seem to be so temperamental about any little thing at all that they shut everything down. There is a certain irony in that, but we will not get into that today. The reality is that we need to have as many markets open to us as possible. There needs to be a clear road map in order that farmers can understand how we are going to get through this. If we have a spread of this disease in May, what is going to happen then? Will we have widespread vaccination in place?”
“It would be vital for the trade to try to have some solution put in place as early as possible. Many farmers out there are at their wits' end. I have been contacted by farmers who have large numbers of animals in stock and ready to go. They had customers in the North for them but they cannot sell them now. They are in real difficulty in that respect. As we know, disease control and the difficulties with it have a long history for farmers. I am not going to go into the TB scenario, but people are afraid that we may be looking at a similar situation down the road. The Minister mentioned in his speech that a change in the categorisation will result in a move from bluetongue being a disease for eradication to a disease for monitoring across the EU. What is that going to mean? Where will it put farmers in respect of disease-free status, etc.?”
“There is a lot of movement. That can be a problem, particularly if the disease was already in the country last autumn and was undetected. Has it moved or has it spread? That is something that will only be ascertained if we can get adequate testing in place. We need to do that as quickly as possible. The issue of cross-Border trade is a real problem. Several mart managers and people in my part of the world are concerned about this. I got a parliamentary question only last week in respect of it. I understand that the certificate obviously cannot comply with the conditions that are there at present unless a derogation is put in place. The Minister might explain where we are at with that. Are there any active negotiations or discussions with the Minister's counterparts north of the Border or in Britain to try to work out a solution for that?”
“It is probable that they were infected then, but it was not picked up or noticed until the animals went to slaughter. That is another issue with this, which makes it very difficult for farmers. We encourage them to be vigilant and to try to take all the precautions possible but if animals, particularly bovines, are not showing any symptoms, it is very difficult for anyone to be vigilant. That is one of the key problems we have here. I mentioned to the Minister before that we need to do more random testing to try to see if any other areas are affected. Maybe this would concentrate mainly on the east coast. As we know, the nature of farming in Ireland is different from many other countries. Animals, particularly cattle, move up and down across the country an awful lot. Animals come from marts in one place to another.”
“We are all somewhat at a loss as to how we got into this situation. We now have bluetongue both north and south of the Border. We have a major difficulty with animals moving up and down across the Border. That is a very difficult problem, particularly in my part of the world where an awful lot of the marts are experiencing a huge loss in trade because of it. Bluetongue is obviously a virus that is mainly a summer problem in respect of its spread because the virus does not live in the little midges that spread it when the temperature is below 12°C. Of course, in the winter months that is not an issue. However, the cases that have been found in County Wexford likely became infected by midges that came across at the end of last summer or early autumn.”
“This is not a historical problem; it is happening now. People are being failed by the mental health service. I saw the Tánaiste on that programme. I can only say that his announcement was fraudulent. He stated that things would get better; they have got worse. People with mental health issues who approach the system get worse outcomes than they got 20 years ago because the Government closed everything down and replaced it with nothing. People are so frustrated and so annoyed.”
“I am sure the Tánaiste watched the "Prime Time Investigates" programme on the mental health service and the catastrophe within it. The families of Natalie McGuinness and Jimmy Loughlin, both of whom lost their lives as a consequence of failures within the mental health service, appeared on the programme. Both families live in my constituency, and I have their issues here several times. Many other families who appeared on the programme expressed their frustration at being stonewalled by the system and at not getting any accountability. I recently tabled a parliamentary question about the number of people who presented at Sligo University Hospital with mental health issues in 2025. The reply indicated that 1,242 people presented to the emergency department but that only 198 were admitted.”
“We know that but the problem we have here is that the Irish Government is a guarantor of the agreement and has a role to play in ensuring all the parts of the agreement, including the parts which are about delivering truth and reconciliation to people, are actually delivered.”
“It was a determination of British Government policy in Ireland to employ people to be able to undermine the legitimate causes that many people had to seek their freedom and their aspirations and to have equality and justice, including social justice, in their country. It undermined that and it propagated conflict and division. The British state has now tried to cover that up. Even when we have an agreement and even when we are in a post-conflict situation, it continues to cover it up. The layers of cover-up are, in themselves, a crime against the many people who have been victims of this conflict. I acknowledge progress is slow.”
“When we examine these reports, they lay bare the reality of the collusion of the British state with agents it hired, paid, propagated and moved in and out through different parts of the conflict, always to its own benefit. They were always used to the benefit of the British state. That is why we are in this situation and it continues to cover up that reality. It went to the very core of the British establishment. It went right to Whitehall. It was not some loose arrangement as they tried to push people out there to consider that was the way it happened. It did not happen that way. It went straight to the centre of Whitehall.”
“Certainly, for those who suffered so much at the hands of the people who were involved in all of this, not just our sympathies but our commitment has to be that truth can be restored. There has to be a pathway to do that. The withdrawal of the British Government from the Stormont House Agreement and from many of the other agreements that were put in place after the Good Friday Agreement tells us there is a huge reluctance by the British state to actually engage meaningfully when it comes to truth and reconciliation. That is why we have to be very firm when it comes to understanding that both the Irish and British Governments are guarantors of that agreement and both have a role to play in it.”
“The issue of the Operation Kenova report has gone on for ten years and at the core of it is the very concept that the British state broke the law and set out to break the law. I was just thinking earlier of Michael Davitt. He used to say the law was little more than another weapon in the government's arsenal to keep the lord in his mansion and the peasant in his place. It is very much the same thing here because the law clearly only applies to certain people and not to those who are the state operators in respect of all of this. The thousands of people who suffered as a consequence of the conflict are all too aware that the law was something that was there only for some - only for the select few.”
“It is about time that we stepped in firmly, not just here in Ireland but globally, to ensure that we prevent any more of this from happening.”
“We do not know who they are and there is no way of finding out who is behind all of this. The tech companies will not tell us who they are either. These companies have a responsibility. If they can say they are only facilitating what is happening, then the minimum they can do is identify those they are facilitating. At present, they do not do that to any great extent. The purpose of the legislation is to deal with this relatively new phenomenon whereby the technology that is used has the capacity to visually undress and sexualise children and women, and use that as a weapon. This is about a power imbalance. All of these things are about power. It is about people who think that they have the power to humiliate and degrade others and that this enrich and lift them up.”
“As the Minister of State knows, the purpose of the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences (Amendment) Bill is to try to ensure that we can avoid situations where individuals are taking advantage of technology. He mentioned that technology is moving so fast it is hard to keep up with it. That is certainly the point. He also made a valid point to the effect that the victims are primarily women and children, which means that the perpetrators are primarily men. That is something else that has to be considered in respect of this. For many years, social media, which is really antisocial media, has allowed the development of pornography and the spread and normalisation of hateful and harmful abuse. An element of that has been happening for some time and no checks have been put in place. So many people online are anonymous.”
“The Minister knows this motion was submitted last week, before the committee's decision was made for Larry Murrin to come in. The vote on this motion will not be held until next week. There will be a full week after we hear from Larry Murrin tomorrow to digest what he says, ask further questions and deal with this issue. The Minister and his backbenchers, many of whom, including from his party, have told me privately that they are extremely unhappy with the position the Minister has taken, have a week to decide what way they will vote. I am confident that if they are true to themselves and to the farmers of the country, they will vote to ensure that Larry Murrin is removed from his position.”