Arbitration (Amendment) Bill 2025: Committee Stage (Resumed) Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-28 ============================================================ Thomas Byrne (FF), Meath East I was pretty robust with everybody who spoke in the previous debate. I robustly defended my own position and tried to get the correct information out. I will be robust with Sinn Féin now because, quite frankly, it is hard to take seriously its amendment to insert subsection (3C), which states, "materially compromise the State’s obligation ... to give effect to European Union law (including the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms) and to preserve its coherence and integrity". Every time there has been a referendum in this State relating to European law for the betterment of the country and for greater cohesion, Sinn Féin has voted "No". It has done so in every referendum to put that into effect. The Senator is now telling me that Sinn Féin is coming to the Seanad worried sick about this issue because somehow it is in jeopardy. It has been a fundamental position of Sinn Féin that it opposes the very thing it is looking for here today. On that basis, it is very hard to take the party seriously or to take seriously some of the arguments coming forward. I have said repeatedly to Sinn Féin, Senators Higgins and O'Reilly and Aontú that the right to regulate is clearly defined. This Bill is not about the ratification of CETA. Everybody is quoting from bits of judgments and bits of laws. The Government cannot do that. It has to look at every line of every judgment and agreement. We cannot pick and choose. Senators are quoting the fact that the ratification of CETA was found to be an unconstitutional matter. That is accepted by everybody. The Government, more than anybody, has to take cognisance of that because it wants to ratify it. Nobody goes on to talk about what Mr. Justice Hogan suggested in his judgment. He was not giving an instruction to the Oireachtas or the Government. He made suggestions. The only person who referred to it previously was Senator McDowell. He was dismissive of Mr. Justice Hogan in that respect. The amendment would replace the language that has been developed having regard to the Costello case and is intended to address the concerns of the Supreme Court. Neither amendment can be accepted. The Government, with the assistance of the Attorney General, has carefully considered what the Supreme Court said. It is confident that the Bill addresses the concerns of the court in this case. We do not believe that adding the language set out in the amendment would achieve greater clarity. As a matter of legal policy, it is preferable to leave it to the courts to determine in any given case that the constitutional order of the State would be compromised by enforcing a particular award. The Senators' amendment is prescriptive on a matter that is properly one for determination by the courts. In the amendment from Senators O'Reilly and Keogan, under what would be a new subsection (3C), they are asking us to put in a provision that would "materially impair the capacity of the State to legislate or regulate in the public interest" in the enforcement. However, they are completely ignoring that the right to regulate is in CETA itself, the interpretative instrument and the opinion of the CJEU. The right to regulate is protected. It is a matter with which the investor courts must comply. We keep saying that the right to regulate is not affected. There have been considerable efforts to ensure that is the case. It is not a matter of the enforcement in Irish law. It is a matter of the agreement, which is subject to a separate legal process to ratify. This legislation does not ratify it. A number of cases were put forward in the Seanad as if they were, perhaps, precedents for us to accept. They are not precedents because each and every one of the cases quoted in the Seanad was under the old system, which has been reformed and which we cannot go back to. This is about as much as I can say on the amendments. It has been set out very clearly that this is about the enforcement of potential awards. The right to regulate is separately provided for in the CETA agreement. We are not concerned about this in the slightest. Senator Higgins put forward the idea that the public interest is not in the mix but it is in the mix because the whole basis of the right to regulate under the agreement is about the public interest in the State and the State regulating, passing laws and having policies as essentially its electorate deems fit in the general elections, which ultimately appoint governments and parliaments. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. 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