Mr. Seán Kirwan:

It would certainly, I think, meet the definition of archaeological object under the existing legislation. We would anticipate that it would do so under the new legislation. There is, under the existing legislation and will be under the new legislation, two parallel streams of protection. There are monuments of various kinds and there are also moveable objects, which when they meet a definition of archaeological object have quite a high level of protection. Under existing law and under what is proposed here it is a criminal offence to alter an archaeological object without a licence, in practice issued by the National Museum. We would anticipate that would continue under the proposed scheme. Certainly, the definition of archaeological object, and I will not go into the detail, but any object that really has a greater value by reason of the archaeological interest attaching to it, and that is its own intrinsic value, which is the core of the definition, would be an archaeological object and is under existing law. I think that the Book of Kells would certainly likely fall into that and be subject to a licensing requirement.