Delays in takedown orders being issued to social media companies can stoke tensions in communities, cause trauma to victims, and place gardaí and individuals in harm's way, and have caused demonstrable harm to people. There are multiple occasions where response times for takedown requests can be very slow, by which time, as recently illustrated, images and videos can be viewed millions of times. I am sure the Taoiseach would agree it should not be the case that An Garda Síochána would have to ask people to refrain from sharing offending images or videos. Can the Taoiseach outline if he is satisfied with the legislative framework for such measures and the response times of social media companies for such takedown requests, and that an appropriate range of sanctions are available?

I thank Deputy Farrell for raising this important question. The legislation is relatively new and Coimisiún na Meán and the Online Safety Commissioner are relatively new. I have not actually seen any evidence-based assessment yet as to what the response times are and what they are by company; I would like to see too. My sense is that the legislation is good enough but it is still new and the response from some of the companies is not as good as it should be. It is early days yet.