I move:

That the period for reporting back of the Joint Committee on Marriage Breakdown be extended to the 2nd April, 1985.

In moving the motion I should like to make a short statement. The joint committee at their meeting yesterday morning learned with regret of the illness of the clerk of the committee. Because of this it was not possible to have the report printed, assembled and circulated to Members in time for a formal adoption by the joint committee. In the circumstances the committee decided unanimously to refer formal adoption of the report to Wednesday next, 27 March, and to defer presentation of the report to both Houses until Tuesday, 2 April, 1985.

Have all the U-turns given the clerk a dizzy head?

For the fourth time we are being asked to postpone the report of this committee. While I sympathise with the clerk on his illness, I find it extraordinary that at such a late date the committee must come here to seek this further extension. On the third occasion on which an extension was sought, we were given a categorical assurance that there would be no further extension. Can the chairman of the committee give us a categorical assurance now that, regardless of illness or of general election or anything else, the report will be before us on 2 April?

I have no information regarding the health problem of the official in question and neither can I guarantee that no one else will become ill.

The whole issue is being turned into a farce.

Will the Deputies who are supporting the call for a division please rise?

Deputies Mac Giolla and De Rossa rose.

As fewer than ten Deputies have risen, in accordance with Standing Order I declare the motion carried. The names of the Deputies who called for a division will be recorded in the Journal of the Proceedings of the Dáil