Arbitration (Amendment) Bill 2025: Committee Stage (Resumed)
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-28
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Alice-Mary Higgins (IND), National University of Ireland

I am keen, with others, I think, to move through the amendments we have. There are a number of very important and pertinent amendments to discuss today. As I am in possession, and before we move to decide on the section, I will make a small correction on the matter that was being discussed when we adjourned. I had said that the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes, ICSID, rules, the older arbitration rules, can be used in relation to the CETA agreement and the Minister had suggested that was only by consent. In fact, that is not the case. They can be used by an investor. The area that requires consent is if the investor wants to use the investor court system, ICS. If one wants to use the new investor court system, that requires the consent of both parties. If the consent of both parties to use the new investor court system is not forthcoming, the investor can choose to use the ICSID convention and the ICSID additional facility rules. The exact opposite is true, therefore. These supposedly better rules will only apply if corporations decide they want to use them, and they will have the discretion to move back. That is made clear under Article 8.23 of CETA, which states that a claim can be submitted under "the ICSID Convention and Rules of Procedure", the "ICSID Additional Facility Rules", the "UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules" or "any other rules on agreement of the disputing parties." It is only where the investor chooses to use these supposedly reformed - I would question that - ICS rules that consent is required from both parties. Otherwise, the investor has full discretion.
We need to be factually clear and accurate that what we are being asked to sign off on in CETA, as well as the fact that it is wide open in other areas of the Bill for any kind of arbitration rules, is a situation where corporations can use those rules of their choice in relation to a decision, and they are not bound, unless they choose to be bound, by any of the very moderate reforms that were made to the ICS. That is just a correction. We will have time to get back into this because we have an amendment in relation to this. That is under Article 8.23.
I will now move to the section and our amendments but that was a fact that was being debated when the debate adjourned.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:01+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-28