Seanad Report: Criticising the arrest and jailing of a young pregnant Limerick woman who "owed a couple of hundred euro as a result of a road tax case in court", Labhrás Ó Murchú (FF) said: "I couldn't imagine what's after happening in the most repressive regimes in the world."
A disturbing report published about the matter should, he believed, be a source of great concern to all reasonable people.
"I am told that within the prison she was highly traumatised. She was acting uncontrollably and she was within days of giving birth.
"She was then taken to hospital where she gave birth and then disappeared from the hospital itself."
Mr Ó Murchú said people really needed to find out how this could happen.
"There are people walking the streets at the moment who constantly thumb their noses at the courts; people who are in debt - millions of euro - to the State, and yet here's a case of a young woman who had no one to defend her, and to be placed in that position.
"I don't think it's acceptable, because I obviously believe that as legislators in some way this eventually impacts on us as well. It's not a matter of suggesting that people shouldn't be held accountable, but for heaven's sake, surely common sense and compassion was what should have been employed in this particular case."
Acting house leader John Dardis (PD) said he did not know the particulars of the case Mr Ó Murchú had mentioned.
"But on the face of it, it does seem extraordinary that it should happen in a modern society and it seems very insensitive and very wrong. I will take the matter up with the Minister for Justice."