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Seanad Éireann debate -
Thursday, 10 Jul 2014

Vol. 233 No. 3

Radiological Protection (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2014: Committee Stage (Resumed)

Debate resumed on amendment No. 4:
In page 9, after line 41, to insert the following:
“Establishment and functions of the Office of Radiological Protection
15. (1) The Office of Radiological Protection shall be established by this Agency within its organisational structure.
(2) Management and direction of the Office of Radiological Protection shall be the responsibility of the person who becomes a director of the Agency under section 14(1).
(3) The Agency shall ensure that all functions transferred to the Agency under section 6(1) shall be administered from and carried out by the Office of Radiological Protection.”.
(Senator Jim Walsh)

I believe there has been quite a bit of toing and froing on this. I think the exchange of views has been exhausted at this stage and unless the Minister of State has something specific to say, I would like to move on.

I would like to make one more comment, if I may. It will be the function of the director general of the newly-merged organisation to arrange the distribution of the business of the agency among its directors, but this must be done having regard to the statutory functions and requirements of the organisation.

Accordingly, it would not be appropriate or desirable for legislation to prescribe the divisional organisation of the EPA, or to confer one of the offices with a more pre-eminent or differentiated role. Nonetheless, the board, including the director, will have to continue to ensure that sufficient resources and effort are being made to meet all of the merged bodies' functions which include, specifically, the director of radiological protection.

It is clear to me, from my reading of it, that the director general must appoint five directors, one of whom will have to be fully knowledgeable in this area. I cannot envisage a situation where that would not be the director of that section.

I do not wish to labour this point but I thank the Minister of State for elucidating it. I doubt if he is saying, however, that the director general will appoint the five other directors because that position would be totally untenable. I presume the directors are appointed by the State - that is, by the Minister of the day, rather than by the director general. I see that functionaries can be appointed and that recruitment will be done. Therefore, whoever is recruited to be head of the office of the radiological protection section will be recruited within the organisation by the director general. However, if a person with that important function is not a director of the overall agency then the function, role and status of the person to whom the responsibility lies in that office will be diminished.

It is entirely reasonable therefore that something should be stitched into legislation stating that person would be a director. Maybe there is a protocol concerning this, but I am asking the Minister of State to consider that point before we come back the next day on Report Stage.

On Report Stage we can take on board those views and I will provide the Senator with clarification.

I accept the Minister of State's bona fides on that completely.

No problem. That is fine.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Sections 15 to 20, inclusive, agreed to.
SECTION 21
Question proposed: "That section 21 stand part of the Bill."

I will be asking the Minister of State to examine this section on Report Stage.

Sections 22 to 47, inclusive, agreed to.

Question put and agreed to.
SCHEDULE
Question proposed: "That the Schedule be the Schedule to the Bill."

I notice that under "Fundamental principle L" there is a clause about confidentiality. It reads, "The State should establish requirements for protecting the confidentiality of information, the unauthorised disclosure of which would compromise the physical protection of nuclear material and nuclear facilities." I accept that, as it is written, but I would not like that clause to be used to conceal information which should be available to the public, say, about risks concerning nuclear power plants, particularly ones in Britain which are our main cause of concern in this jurisdiction. I would like the Minister of State to assure us that there is nothing in that clause which could be used either by officialdom or the nuclear plants themselves to conceal information which should be in the public domain in the interests of protecting our citizenry.

As regards the Senator's question, I am assured by my officials that will not, and could not, happen. There is no doubt about that. While it might be slightly ambiguous to say so, before I was a Minister I did try to get information from the RPII under the Freedom of Information Act. There was information I could not get but it was within the Act. In other words, it was information that I could not have obtained given the legislation in place.

Security and safety issues are of primary concern. There is no doubt about having total clarity and knowledge about any information that can legally be put into the public domain.

I thank the Minister of State.

Question put and agreed to.
TITLE
Question proposed: "That the Title be the Title to the Bill."

On a point of information, we are not pre-empting Report Stage here, are we?

No, I have not got there yet.

Question put and declared carried.
Bill reported without amendment.

When is it proposed to take Report Stage?

Report Stage ordered for Tuesday, 15 July 2014.
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