Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome all the witnesses. On behalf of members, I thank the witnesses for the important work they are doing in this area. Increasingly, the whole area of business and human rights is a global issue.

These are people whose lives are threatened and whose homes are being destroyed. Ms Curran mentioned some of the countries where people are being displaced. Increasingly, it is becoming more the work of our committee to hear from witnesses making representations on behalf of such people.

I agree that we need a binding United Nations treaty to deal with business and human rights, as well as mandatory rights and environmental due diligence legislation to ensure that businesses respect human rights across their activities. I agree with the idea that state companies, and particularly Irish State companies, need to give the lead on that. It makes so much sense that each Department would roll that out. I cannot understand the reluctance to make that change or why we are slow in making that change. Is it just that there is not enough pressure being put on or does it relate to Government policy? Are ideological reasons the cause of this slowness to change because people do not want to interfere with the conditions for businesses investing in Ireland and so on? Will our guests elaborate on this?

I have raised a clear example on a number of occasions, both here and with the Tánaiste, regarding the Cerrejón mine in Colombia and the impact it is having on local people. Those affected are mostly indigenous people and women in particular. They are the target for many of these groups. We hear of things happening abroad but we have an example of some of the threats in the recent torture of Mr. Kevin Lunney of Quinn Industrial Holdings. It gave some insight into the type of pressure being applied. That is a separate matter but what those company directors have gone through because of criminality has been made clear. Our guests mentioned some of the pressure exerted on human rights defenders. They can be charged with criminal acts and so forth or detained for long periods in many cases. Some have been detained for years. We are told if a trade unionist is killed in Colombia that it is nothing to do with the fact he or she was a trade unionist. We might be told it was a family dispute or a local argument. It is an effort to try to dismiss that the act arose because of a person's work on human rights.

Some 90% of the coal used in the Moneypoint power station comes from Cerrejón. On the one hand, we are saying we should move forward while at the same time a State company like the ESB is buying coal, the mining of which is having an impact on the indigenous people there. We had some human rights defenders before the committee who told us their lives are under threat. They live in the area and highlight the pollution there, the lack of clean water and people being forced off their land. The company is buying land at ridiculous prices and in many countries people may not have a legal document for that, which brings its own problems.

Are our guests of the view that the Government or semi-State companies should carry out human rights evaluations? How should that be driven forward? We have heard the human rights committee that has been established has met three times. Does it have a role in this area? Would our committee have a role? What should we be doing differently with this, particularly in the context of the companies based in Ireland? Many of us are extremely critical of Ireland's current corporate tax code, particularly as it is clear that Ireland is a haven being used by multinational companies to avoid paying tax in other countries. Do our guests believe that some of the companies domiciled in Ireland for tax purposes may have connections to serious human rights violations? They mentioned a survey and violations in supply chains. If the State is not complying with what is clear Government policy, are we expecting too much of the companies to do so? How can we put pressure on them? Our guests mentioned that voluntary guidelines are not enough and this must be something set in law. Should there be greater legislation coming from the Oireachtas rather than the United Nations?

Work has long been under way on a binding United Nations treaty on business and human rights. Again, there does not seem to be any real urgency about that. Should Ireland play the same leading role that we did with regard to the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons? Is that the type of championing our guests would like to see Ireland involved in? There is a lukewarm response to the matter so I am keen to dig into the reasons. We have raised questions with the Tánaiste in the Chamber and he always has a positive message but we are not seeing this filtering through Departments, etc. What is the view of our guests on the Government's approach to negotiations for the treaty to date? What changes would they like to see adopted?

There is a national plan on business and human rights from 2017 to 2020. It was launched to great fanfare but it appears that every date the Government set as a target was not met. What more would the witnesses like to see with that plan? Do we need a plan to run from 2021 to 2025? I am keen to know what role our committee should play in this. Should we invite representatives of that human rights business group before us? It is newly established and has had three meetings but I do not really have a sense of the work it does. Do our guests have some guidelines in the context of what we, as legislators and parliamentarians, should be doing?