Dr. Susan Steele:

It is a minimum of two months. Under the legislation, it is a two-month consultation period. That is if we are in a position where it passes through Parliament. There was a significant delay on the previous occasion when the control plans were submitted. The committee should be aware not to take it as that.

In the interim period, we have been working with the industry. I praise the industry, which has been looking at solutions for this. There have been groups buying shared weighing scales that they are putting into piers and lot boxes for smaller piers. As we were saying earlier, there is a huge component of the Irish industry which is compliant and it has been looking at how to comply and how to make this situation work. It is to work with them in looking at solutions.

The control plan is gone. The weighing has to be in the same way as it was ten years ago, at landing. We are looking at how we define the landing areas. For some situations, that includes the apron area and the pier area. The only step forward is to work with us to ensure compliance.

In the interim period, it is literally to move to the new situation to have weighing equipment to put in place for quality. It is a significant change but many members of the industry are looking at this and at how they can work into a compliant situation with it. There will not be a change to this in the short term.