The Garda should be given powers to warn creches and clubs if a person applying to them for a job had been accused of abusing a child, even if the applicant was never convicted, the Oireachtas Committee on Child Protection will urge.
Currently, the Garda's Thurles-based Central Vetting Unit can only reveal whether or not a job applicant has been convicted, but this offers inadequate protection for children, the TDs and Senators on the committee believe.
Such a move would mark a dramatic change in Irish law and would require a referendum to achieve, sources said last night.
The current law makes it an offence for a person to fail to notify an employer if they have been convicted of any offences against children if they were to be allowed unsupervised access to children if they got the job.
However, there is no general legal requirement for a person working with children to have received Garda clearance unless they are applying for a State-paid job.
Currently, the Garda Central Vetting Unit checks prospective Health Service Executive employees, or those seeking work with agencies dealing with children that are funded by the HSE. However, the Government aims to extend it to all organisations that "recruit people who have substantial unsupervised access to children and vulnerable adults", as well as bouncers and nightclub staff.
Lawyers for the committee, chaired by Limerick Fianna Fáil TD Peter Power, have been given until next Friday to finalise a draft report before publication by the end of next week. A referendum must be held to reverse the Supreme Court's judgment that allowed men the chance to deny that they did not know the age of a girl with whom they had sex, the TDs and Senators agreed.
Following days of negotiations, the committee agreed that the age of consent should be lowered to 16, after Fine Gael's decision to drop its objections to such a move.
If implemented, the committee's recommendations would mean that adults would not be able to claim that they did not know the age of a sexual partner if it emerges that the boy or girl was under 16 at the time.
The Director of Public Prosecutions James Hamilton told the committee during a private meeting in September that the offence of statutory rape "fulfilled a vital place in the scheme of criminal law". He said it was "reasonable that there should be an age at which sex with a young person should be an offence, even if that person consents".