Ms Ann Marie Part:

In terms of legal requirements, we are bound by EU legislation as it stands so I would not have any recommendations in that regard. On the facilities at the ports at Rosslare and Dublin, we operate border control posts, which means there are minimum requirements. The unloading bays, inspection rooms, storage areas, toilet facilities and so on must be of food-quality level, for example.

They have been provided to us in both of those locations but we are able to use them. There is, obviously, significant work going on in terms of rebuilding and restructuring around Dublin Port. The permanent facilities for the HSE environmental health service are currently under construction and due to be available to us at the end of this year. That is on track and we have no reason to believe it will not be. In the interim, and in another example of inter-agency co-operation and collaboration, we have been working well with our colleagues in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, who have been facilitating us in co-locating in some locations. From our perspective, what we need is currently there and what we are hoping to have permanently will be there for us at the end of the year. It is worth acknowledging again that significant work was done in a very short period of time to make all that work. I will defer to our colleagues from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.