The first matter on the agenda is the draft second annual report of the Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny, which has been circulated to members. I call on Deputy Allen, Chairman of the sub-committee, to comment in that regard.
Report of Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny.
I was appointed Chairman of the Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny in November 2004. Since taking up that role, I have gained a greater appreciation of its important legislative work. It is important to recall that European Union legislation determines domestic law, either directly, through EU regulations, or indirectly, through the national transposition of directives. Scrutiny of EU legislative proposals provides Members of the Houses of the Oireachtas with valuable additional or advance information regarding the legislative process at European level.
The scrutiny process at the level of the national parliaments of the EU is also becoming a topic, advancing co-operation between the parliaments of the EU. In that regard, the sooner a mechanism is in place to share information between national parliaments, the sooner they can deepen yet further that process within the EU's institutional architecture. It is important that Ireland, and the Oireachtas in particular, play its full role in shaping that process and, at another level, in shaping EU legislation by making its views known to Departments and European institutions. Such a contribution to the legislative process would help ensure that the EU makes the best decisions regarding the citizens of member states.
The scrutiny process established under the 2002 Act provides for matters to be considered in greater detail by Oireachtas committees, which are afforded the opportunity to provide their expertise and perspective on matters referred by the Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny or which they elect to consider. The Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny was built on the original Act and also considers proposed decisions. Several joint committees also exchange views with Ministers before Council meetings and I know from experience at this committee that meetings preparatory to General Affairs and External Relations meetings are very useful. I understand that other committees also use such arrangements to good effect.
The second report from the Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny again highlights the volume and quality of the legislative work that it undertook in 2004, during which it considered 569 EU proposals of varying significance. A total of 87 of these were referred to the appropriate sectoral committees, the sub-committee having deemed that they warranted further scrutiny.
I thank the members for their laborious work and religious attendance at meetings of the sub-committee. It is regrettable that there is not greater appreciation of their valuable work and dedicated efforts. There is also a vast amount of documentation that requires careful consideration and that must be copied, bundled and forwarded to members by a very small secretariat. I am amazed at times that the objectives of the process are successfully achieved, given the resources available to the committee. Were it not for the Trojan and committed work of the secretariat, that would not be possible. I commend the report to the committee.
I thank the Deputy. Does anyone have any matters to raise?
I thank the sub-committee for its work. It is an area in which I would love to become involved but not at present.
The Deputy is welcome to become a member of the sub-committee. Perhaps someone might offer to second if I formally propose his nomination.
My child care arrangements will not allow me to attend at that hour of the morning. If meetings were held at a different time, I would play a role.
We should highlight, to the credit of members, the number of documents the sub-committee has considered. That number is increasing rather than decreasing and this is evident if one examines the reports from 2002 to 2004. I presume that the 2005 report will be longer still. In 2004, 569 documents were considered. It would be a credit for any committee to scrutinise and wade through that number of documents. The single worrying aspect is the number of documents that have been adopted before scrutiny. That is not the fault of the sub-committee. It is usually the fault of the system that such documents do not reach the sub-committee in time or that there are tight deadlines attaching to them. This is a criticism of the European Union. Perhaps some of those documents fell into a gap during the summer months but the EU must be realistic in the deadlines it sets in order that national parliaments can get to grips with scrutinising directives, regulations, etc., properly. It is a job well done.
That is a very relevant issue. Sometimes proposals have been adopted prior to their coming before the sub-committee. We have been toying with that problem, with some success, in that we have impressed upon Departments that they should issue the documents to us and give us adequate time to consider them and, if necessary, refer them to sectoral committees. That problem has been successfully dealt with. There are exceptions and some Departments default but we have informed the latter that we are not impressed.
I congratulate the sub-committee. I am stunned at the number of documents, 569, it has scrutinised. I do not know how its members handle so many documents and I do not have any suggestion regarding how that might easily be done.
Perhaps I might make another point regarding EU directives. I wish to raise the issue of Ireland's competitiveness. I recently came across a businessman with 3,000 or 4,000 employees around the world, some hundreds of whom are located in Ireland. He said that one directive in particular had been imposed in Ireland in a manner that means it takes him four months to get through the red tape and bureaucracy. Under whatever system the British adopted, the corresponding time is three weeks. When we receive an EU directive, we can transpose it in whatever way suits us, as long as it is within the directive's framework. We should examine what our fellow member states are doing to put legislation into effect. We should always try to make that legislation as light as possible to ensure we are more competitive in attracting foreign direct investment.
We can do two things, the first being to take into account only ourselves and Brussels. I would like to take into account what others have already done. I am not sure how to do that. The Chairman of the sub-committee might be able to tell us. It seems we are normally criticised by Brussels for being at the back of the queue regarding such matters. That is an advantage from our perspective, since we can see what others have done. If we have a policy of ensuring the way in which we transpose directives into legislation is with a light rather than a heavy touch, it is less likely we will suffer the disadvantage of Dundalk competing against Newry. If Britain is doing something that attracts outside investment and we are doing something that takes into account other issues but is less likely to attract outside investment, there will be a different imposition regarding a directive in Dundalk as against Newry. If there are 25 nations doing this, and Ireland is towards the end, I suggest the scrutiny committee may be able to find a way of examining what others have done to ensure we use this as a competitive advantage.
Does Deputy Allen wish to respond?
Yes.
May I ask a question first in regard to the person to whom Senator Quinn spoke? Did he make a direct charge that has cost him money and jobs?
I think his point was that when he is looking at where to invest in future he is more likely to go somewhere other than to Ireland if we continue with the policy of putting in place heavy legislation with a light touch. In other words, he is fearful that the way we do things makes us less attractive for investment purposes. He is Irish.
Our sub-committee delegates the directive to the appropriate sectoral committee. It is up to that committee to decide what do with it. If the Senator gets this example perhaps he would firm up on it and present it to the sub-committee and, as an exercise, we could see how we compare to other jurisdictions in the way we apply the directives to regulations.
The way to find that out is to choose a number of directives and compare and contrast them with a number of other countries. One can choose relevant directives to see how they affect industry here. One could choose 20 or 30 others and then find out the timeframe involved in other countries. There is a simple way of doing that. If we have a problem it will be discovered very quickly.
I think we have a problem. We have not always done a regulatory impact analysis on every item that comes through. Perhaps that would delay it even more. I take Deputy Allen's point. I will get the details of the case. I think he would be very happy to publicise it.
Does Deputy Allen wish to follow up on that?
We will take that as an example and do a comparison with other countries.
Is it possible to have the Order of Business of the Seanad displayed on one of the monitors because in the event of a vote I doubt if we will hear the bells?
The Sub-Committee on European Scrutiny is one of the most important committees in the Oireachtas given the amount of legislation and directives coming through. I applaud the sub-committee on the work it has done. I am a sub on that committee and I sat through one or two meetings and I found it hard going. I recall being at the COSAC meeting last weekend where the Maltese delegate complained about the amount of legislation and said they were unable to cope with the directives and so on. The sub-committee deserves to be complimented on the work it has done. I compliment Mr. Geiran, the prime mover behind the scenes on that sub-committee, on the work he does in preparing the material for the committee. He deserves to be praised highly.
As I understand it, Mr. Geiran cannot speak in public but I will thank him for the Senator. I thank Mr. Geiran.
This is a response to the members of the sub-committee also who are not present.
I thank Deputy Allen and the sub-committee for the work it does. I cannot over-emphasise how important it is. I take the Deputy's point with regard to the unsung heroes on the sub-committee, all of whom are patriots. The amount of work done by the committee is not appreciated and the volume of documents scrutinised, 569 according to Senator Quinn, is a lot of work for which I thank the sub-committee.
I propose that the report as circulated be laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas and that a copy is forwarded to the scrutiny co-ordinators in each Government Department. Is that agreed? Agreed.
The joint committee went into private session at 3.15 p.m. and adjourned at 3.30 p.m. sine die.