Arbitration (Amendment) Bill 2025: Report and Final Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-09
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Thomas Byrne (FF), Meath East

I can only comment on the amendment at hand. The amendment speaks about the avoidance of doubt but does not appear to reflect the current legal position in the Bill or in current law. The proposed amendment appears to be an attempt to circumvent the withdrawal provisions and any applicable sunset clauses included in a relevant international agreement through domestic law. The Bill has been drafted to ensure compliance with the Constitution and the international obligations Ireland would assume upon ratification of the relevant agreements. The inclusion of this amendment would not be inclined to those obligations and, therefore, we cannot agree to it.
Senator Higgins has argued that Ireland should not ratify CETA and other similar agreements because in her view the route for potential withdrawal from such agreements in future is not acceptable. In the first instance, I must stress that we have no intention of withdrawing from CETA. There have been ten great years for ordinary working people in this country whose incomes have increased and for businesses. We are working with the legislation to meet all of the domestic requirements in order to be in a position to allow us to go with a proposal to the Government and then to the Dáil to ratify the CETA agreement. In spite of this, it is the case that if the EU and EU member states, including Ireland, come to the conclusion that circumstances arise in the case of CETA or a similar agreement whereby they should withdraw for whatever reason, and it would be really bad news for Ireland if that happened, the agreements include provision for termination.
We have collectively agreed it through the democratic process at EU level. I see the Labour Party criticising this but it was in government when this was negotiated. I do not put any bad faith on them at that time.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-09/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:01+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-09