It is not often I find myself aligned with the Pope. Yesterday, the leader of the Catholic Church released an encyclical, his first, called Magnifica Humanitas, calling for greater guardrails on the use of AI and greater ethical consideration and dialogue around its implementation. One of his key points relates to the culture of power, which means the control of the AI tools, which are having such a far-reaching impact on each of our lives, is in the hands of a few private actors. The way to resolve this is through dialogue, but, mostly, it is through regulation. The Government has proved that it supports a very light-touch response to regulation. We have seen that through the failure to regulate online social media platforms. Will the Government please commit to supporting the AI Act in full and not the digital omnibus package that is currently being pushed through, which essentially guts the approach and brings it back to self-regulation? Will it support a greater regulatory framework and the enforcement of the existing framework in order that we can feel safer about the implementation of these tools?

I commend the Pope on the publication of his encyclical, which is a very important document in the context of how he sees the dehumanisation of people as one of the significant potential consequences of AI. We have not engaged in any light-touch regulation. We have adopted the AI Act. We have also adopted the Single Market Act and the Digital Markets Act. Why is the Deputy talking about light-touch regulation? European legislation has been strong. We have strong domestic and European legislation in respect of online platforms. In fact, a big criticism of Europe, including Ireland, is that it has over-regulated. That is a debate in terms of technology more generally. I do not accept the criticism that we have a light touch.