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

The Minister did not answer the questions. Could he clarify, with a "Yes" or "No", the position on the three instances? I refer to where an award is based on compensation for a measure to ensure the State's compliance with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, a measure to ensure the State's compliance with an ECJ ruling, and a measure taken by the State to ensure compliance regarding a public referendum. The Minister of State is defending the investor court system, but what we also have in front of us is what the High Court is going to be empowered to do, or not. Many of our amendments are trying to strengthen the hand of the High Court because it is not very clear that it will have any strong measures or tools in terms of denying enforcement. Senator McDowell has very adequately pointed to how such a denial of enforcement would be unlikely to stand up, but that is a separate debate.
My question is on the three specific instances. Is it the Minister of State's understanding, under this legislation, that the High Court would be able to deny the enforcement of an award in the three instances?

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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