Neale Richmond (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank all three witnesses for their thoughtful and incredibly challenging presentations. They are excellent pieces and the entire committee is grateful for these presentations, as well as the supporting documentation.

Both Dr. Suttle and Dr. Ankersmit referred to the specifics of the chilling effect, a point into which my colleague Deputy Brady went also. Dr. Suttle pointed towards hypotheticals and potential arguments. Is it possible to lay out clear examples where national governments have stated this is the policy they would like to pursue but were too concerned about legislative actions, hence they watered it down? Dr. Suttle stated investor courts are uncommon. Is it possible to quantify how many are in existence?

Dr. Ankersmit has been working on CETA for quite some time as an academic but also as a campaigner. What sort of reaction did he get from Commission figures when he raised concerns in submissions to the European Parliament or during the pre-scrutiny phase going back a couple of years?

Perhaps the witnesses could work through the sorts of reactions they got.

In Dr. Fennelly's paper and in his comments he referred to a concern that it has been argued the decisions of the tribunal and the appellant tribunal established under chapter 8 of CETA could affect the exclusive lawmaking function of the Oireachtas under Article 15 of the Constitution, and that it has been argued that the tribunal system would involve a transfer of judicial power contrary to Article 34 of the Constitution. Will Dr. Fennelly lay out for the committee who is arguing this point and what is the context when they make these arguments? Is this before the courts of law? Is it based on academic submissions?

My final question is for all three witnesses, which is a similar question I put to David O'Sullivan at last week's hearing. Is it the witnesses' opinion that if CETA is not ratified it simply collapses?