Mr. Barry Dooley:

I am pleased to accept the joint committee's invitation on behalf of the Association of Advertisers in Ireland, AAI, to contribute to its discussion on the general scheme of the public health (alcohol) Bill 2015. The AAI's submission, dated 4 March, and our opening statement which members have to hand only address Part 3 of the Bill, namely, head 9 on page 17, which pertains to the control of marketing and advertising of alcohol products. I am conscious that my presentation should be limited to five minutes and keen to elaborate at some stage during the open discussion on factual information on the Deloitte research findings and Central Copy Clearance Ireland, CCCI, trading as CopyClear. The AAI is a members' organisation, with its members being companies that advertise. There are 43 companies in the membership and their advertising expenditure during 2014 represented in excess of 20% of the overall advertising spend last year. The AAI is the only association focused single-mindedly on the interests of Irish advertisers. Its role is to promote and defend the reasonable freedom to advertise and, consequently, our area of expertise is advertising. Companies join the AAI because they recognise the need to be a responsible advertiser. AAI members understand the freedom to advertise responsibly is a crucial element of a healthy economy. By informing, educating and enriching our society, advertising adds to quality of life. A vocal minority disputes this view and governments and regulators increasingly are put under pressure to impose restrictions that are both unjustified and disproportionate.

I will summarise briefly our specific recommendations and observations to the committee, to be followed by our overall executive summary of the main points. As for the summary of recommendations to the committee, the AAI, first, seeks clarification on the finer details of the Bill to be in a better position to assess its overall implications and comment accordingly.

In respect of subhead (3) of head 9, on page 17 of the Bill, we wish to highlight our recommendations and observations in response to the proposed regulations as detailed under subhead (3), namely, subhead (3)(a), subhead (3)(c), subhead (3)(d) and subhead (3)(f). As for subhead (3)(a), legislation imposing watersheds will result in a loss to Irish broadcast stations only and ignores the reality that many children watch television after 9 p.m. There are five Irish television stations that are likely to be affected and we query the effectiveness of this measure-----