Senator John McGahon- speech from 24 Feb 2022
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Transcript
Yeah, look, like other colleagues, it's, you know, Ukraine is a country that wanted to make closer ties to the European Union, it wanted to join the European Union, wanted to join NATO, and an attack on Ukraine, as initiated by Russia, is an attack on anyone who's a believer in democracy around the world, you know, and that's what's at stake here, it's democracy and the way of life that we all believe in and support, is what's at stake here. Leader, and something else, I'm not asking for debate, I'm not calling for anything, I just want to make reference to a committee that I attended with Senator Carraghey yesterday, which was, I attended the Oireachtas Media Committee yesterday, to see the testimony of Frances Hall, the Facebook whistleblower, and Senator Byrne was there too, and the point that I just want to really mention about Frances is, if you imagine it, last May, nobody knew who she was, no one in this world knew who she was, she saw practices that were going on with Facebook, which she was deeply, deep, which she knew was deeply, deeply wrong, and how their algorithms work, and everything else, and she decided, at immense personal sacrifice, to lift the lid on that, and to let the world know about the shady practices that Facebook engage in when it comes to their algorithms, and now she is known right across the world, she is speaking to parliamentarians right across the world, to try and best inform us about the dangers that are posed by this company, and I just would like to, you know, commend what I say yesterday to her, which is her moral fortitude, to have the ability to be able to do that by yourself, and by yourself, one sole individual, to take on one of the largest companies in the world, virtually by yourself, and to lift the lid on it, I think that's something that is so commendable, and that we can all be so proud of, and I'd just like to put it on the record of this house, that I think Frances Hall has done a tremendous service, not just to Ireland, but right across the world, in allowing us to know exactly what big tech companies are up to, and about how we can best tackle it to protect citizens. Thank you very much.