Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026: Committee and Remaining Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-16
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Jack Chambers (FF), Dublin West

Amendment No. 9 seeks to require a report to be laid before the Dáil, within six months of the passage of this legislation, on the potential impacts of introducing a net contribution clause to public construction contracts. I do not propose to accept this amendment, first, because the focus of the Bill is the designation and fast-tracking of critical infrastructure projects and programmes to existing authorisation processes; it does not extend to construction or procurement matters. More pertinently, however, I believe that the reforms already introduced to the capital works management framework will provide many of the same benefits without placing excessive risk on the taxpayer. For the benefit of the committee, a net contribution clause is a clause agreed in a contract between parties, which, in the case of wrongdoing, limits the liability to that share of any total liability for the same damage for which the party itself is personally responsible. These clauses are not used in the capital works management framework that governs public construction contracts because the Civil Liability Act 1961 provides that where two or more defendants are current wrongdoers, they are fully liable for the damage suffered by the plaintiff. This means that in the event that one of the defendants is unable to meet the judgment against it for its portions of damage caused, the other defendants, that is, those who are joined in any action, could be liable for the full amount and not just their own respective portion. As noted, however, reforms in 2022 to the capital works management framework contracts, in particular, the introduction of limits on liability, went a significant distance towards improving the risk position in public consultancy and construction contracts. All the members of the project team engaged with the public sector undergo a pre-qualification process where their financial capacity is considered. The technical capability criteria also investigate the perspective project member's track record in delivery. As a result, there is a reasonably high level of confidence in the capacity of the tendering field to deliver a particular project. Where issues of negligence do arise, taxpayers would expect that the State should be in a position to recover losses where there is insurance available.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-16/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:03+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-16