THERE was no vote on the Fianna Fail private member's Child Pornography Bill, when debate on the measure concluded last night.
The Minister for Finance Mr Quinn, said the Government was accepting some of the Bill's provisions, which would be incorporated in its own legislation. The Bill, which was moved by Fianna Fail's spokesman on justice, Mr John O'Donoghue, and Mr Eoin Ryan (FF, Dublin South East) proposed a 10-year prison sentence and a fine of up to £100,000 for distributors of child pornography.
A claim by the Minister of State for Justice, Mr Austin Currie, that the Bill was seriously flawed was described by Mr O'Donoghue as a "gratuitous insult". He said the Bill was presented in a spirit of magnanimity.
"Let it not be forgotten that this is the same Government which came to power on a wave of putative indignation over the delay in the Brendan Smyth file. It is a Government which has not produced one single piece of legislation to protect children since then."
Ms Kathleen Lynch (DL, Cork North Central) said child pornography was the paedophile's oxygen. And it was an oxygen which, increasingly, knew no national boundaries. She hoped any changes in the law would be accompanied by a root-and-branch review of the Censorship of Publication Act, with a view to bringing it into the tail end of the 20th century.
The Fianna Fail leader, Mr Bertie Ahern, said child abuse and child pornography transcended all barriers, whether geographic, economic or intellectual.
