Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 2:

In page 4, subsection (1), line 20, to delete paragraph (g).

The amendment provides for the exclusion of mining and drilling operations from the scope of the Bill. Currently section 1(1)(g) includes mining and exploration as a construction activity. These activities should not have been included because similar activities are specifically excluded from the definition of construction activities under EU Directive 2004/18/EC, which relates to procurement procedures for the award of public award contracts. It was not the intention to include such activities as it is our understanding that there is no evidence of payment disputes in these sectors. In any event, given the potential of such sectors, a further regulatory impact analysis would be required before they would be considered for inclusion. It is accepted that when this provision was included, it was done in error, given the fact the sectors are uniquely dealt with, and even if one were to deal with this, it would require a wider exploration than the issues we examined which were exclusively construction related at the time of the regulatory impact statement.