The joint Committee has examined three Commission proposals on customs matters. One relates to the way customs people help each other; another to customs procedures applying to the stores of various goods like fuel and so on that are used on board vessels and aircraft, and the third to the duties on the importation of educational, scientific and cultural material. In the case of mutual assistance, the regulation will come into effect in July 1979. In the case of stores, the date is 1 January 1980, and in the case of educational materials it depends on Ireland ratifying the Florence Agreement. This is about to happen.
We have dealt with mutual assistance on page 3 of our report. It will not require authorities to supply information obtained from banks or related institutions so that people need not be worried about their personal or institutional banking arrangements being revealed. There is also provision for the protection of industrial, commercial or professional secrets.
The views of the Committee are given on page 4. We state that from a practical viewpoint the adoption of the regulation will not make any change in the current practice and mutual assistance in regard to VAT and excise duties will continue to be regulated by the Naples Convention.
In the case of stores of international carriers, the aim of the proposal is to put Community transport operators on an equal footing with transport operators from third countries. We point out that the proposed regulation does not apply to excise duty or to goods sold in duty-free shops or on board ships or aircraft.
On the implications for Ireland, we state that at present fishing vessels are granted duty-free stores only when engaged in deep-sea fishing. In so far as the draft regulation seeks to abolish some existing concessions, the Joint Committee were concerned about fuel for aircraft but since customs duty on this was small it was not significant. We welcomed the provision for fishing boats but were advised that in practice the concessions would not be significant. The Committee fully supported the proposal in so far as it seeks to combat practices of a fraudulent nature in the agricultural sector as these are a drain on Community funds and tend to prejudice the effective operation of the CAP. That was important.
In the case of the educational items, the Florence Agreement covers the duty-free importation of books, works of art, visual and auditory materials, scientific instruments of apparatus and articles for the blind. It is only recently that the agreement was accepted in Ireland because it would have meant some loss of revenue. Some protection of Irish industry was required. We pointed out that duty-free importation of aids for the blind is already allowed under certain regulations but the Committee were advised that little use have been made of this facility perhaps because such goods are most likely to be imported from Britain than from third countries. A protective clause is likely to be invoked to exclude from the facility such common aids as wheelchairs and orthopaedic beds as these are manufactured in Ireland and in the EEC countries. The facility is, therefore, likely to be confined to articles of a specialised nature such as specially adapted typewriters and cassette players. The benefit likely to accrue to handicapped persons is a modest but welcome one. The Committee were happy that the interests of Irish manufacturers could be adequately protected. Basically these are the three items concerned. I have tried to highlight a few points.