Professor Siobhán Mullally:

It has been a concern with regard to merger processes in other contexts that equality issues have not had the same prominence as what are termed human rights. We are very much aware of that background but do not believe it will be a difficulty in the Irish context. We are very confident that equality and human rights issues will be fully addressed and that we will work effectively on both strands of the functions that will be allocated to us.

With regard to the transitional arrangements, we have been formally appointed to the Irish Human Rights Commission as of 16 April.

We have not been formally appointed to the board of the Equality Authority. As there is no functioning board, there is a gap in its governance and oversight. As an interim measure, pending the human rights and equality commission legislation coming into force and our appointment as members of the new commission, it is likely that we will be appointed to the board of the authority. Under the relevant legislation, additional considerations arise with regard to membership of the board and these relate specifically to representatives of employers and employees, which is the social partnership model. It has been specifically recognised that there should not be representation of any particular sector in the new human rights and equality commission and this was part of the recommendation of the working group. In the interim, given that the commission has not yet formally been established and that it is imperative there be proper governance, oversight and a functioning board of the Equality Authority, we are likely to be appointed to the board of the authority. We will have to consider how to resolve the issue that there are 14 of us and only 12 appointees to the board. There would need to be nominations from employees' organisations and employers. We think we can successfully resolve this issue and manage it in the interim, which will be important, particularly given concern that equality issues may lapse or fall into the background during planning for the merger.