I unreservedly condemn the appalling massacre in Manchester but one must also ask where does this viciousness come from.

It is not a natural part of human nature. One must, regrettably, remember the unspeakable massacre of civilians by the American bombing of men, women and children in Falluja.

I rise today to express my regret at the closing of GLEN. It originally emerged from the Hirschfeld Centre. It did a remarkable and very professional job of lobbying and campaigning. It published a series of very important reports on the situation, establishing for the first time a factual basis on which Government policy could be launched. It was originally funded by Chuck Feeney, and we need to pay tribute to his enormous impact and generosity. In the early days of the gay movement, we got no grants whatever. We had to earn all the money ourselves. I remember some weeks I did five discos a night - a week, not a night. Five discos a night would be a bit much even for me.

See you on the dancefloor, Senator Norris.

It is remarkable that I was the person who stopped both Elton John and Freddie Mercury - I did not know who they were - and asked them for their membership certificates. I pay tribute to Brian Sheehan in particular. He did a remarkable job. Kieran Rose also worked extremely hard, even though latterly he was a little foolish. He took me on in something he published in which he said I was unfit to be in politics and should not be allowed into the Seanad because I described the Government's initial civil partnership Bill as a dog licence, but I am absolutely unrepentant. It is the responsibility of independent campaigners to hold the Government to the gold standard and not to lean on it for any little crumb that falls from its table. I pay tribute to GLEN and I am very sorry it has closed down. I thank the organisation as an ordinary gay person for the remarkable work it did and I hope there will be a successor organisation to carry on what it has done. Finally, I would like to say how very sorry I am that the three remaining employees will now find themselves on the dole queue.