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Subject: [AZ-AVONDALEUG] Irish Privacy Bill Could Block Family Tree Research
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2006 00:06:12 EDT

October 09, 2006

Irish Privacy Bill Could Block Family Tree Research


Genealogists have written to Michael McDowell, the Irish justice minister, to
complain that his proposed privacy bill could put them out of business. They
say if the bill is passed they could be denied access to public registers,
such as the records of births, marriages and deaths, an essential resource for
biographers, social historians and genealogists.

The bill, currently before the Seanad, stipulates that if a person complains
that their privacy has been breached, it is not a defence to say the
information you got about them came from a register that is open to the public. In
theory a famous person could object to researchers compiling his family tree
using information from public registers.
What genealogists most fear is that the privacy bill, when enacted, will be
used by cautious librarians to deny them access to records. Michael Merrigan,
secretary of the Genealogical Society of Ireland, said that the bill could “
create a climate of fear”, with genealogical and heraldic research impeded and
publication of information frustrated through the threat of litigation.
You can read more about this issue in the Times Online at
_http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-2393785,00.html_
(http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-2393785,00.html)

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