Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Except for the fact that I am radically opposed to the use of clichés, I would say we need to be the best in the class here. In all seriousness, could the Minister of State explain why the term "if any" is used in his amendment and in the Bill in terms of the appointment of other persons for the board? For example, if the membership of the National Public Health Emergency Team, NPHET, did not include doctors and scientists, but was only guaranteed to include departmental officials, we would be a little worried about the protection of public health. This is the protection of marine health, which, by the way, is public health as well. It is the sustainability of human existence, etc. It is fairly important.

On the idea that it would not be absolutely hard-wired into the board membership to have people who are expert in marine biology, I take the Chair's point. We would have to think about how you would do it, but it is a fair point that there would be somebody who has real knowledge of working on the sea, such as a fisher and not merely someone claiming to represent fishers. I refer to the appointment of persons who really have that expert knowledge and that we are certain, not if they might be there if somebody such as the Minister may decide they will be there. It is that they will be there. They are guaranteed to be there and that knowledge and expertise will be brought to bear on the composition of the board.

I do not understand the Minister of State's fear of imbalance. I do not see what the fear is in that regard. I do not get it. Could the Minister of State elaborate on that point? How could it be anything other than a positive contribution to the composition of the board to have the experts from university in those key areas and experts in the EU law? An important component of Deputies Gould and Ó Broin's proposal here is that we have somebody who really knows back-to-front EU law, knows the directives back to front, and is sure that decisions being made by the board are compliant and, indeed, even better, consistent and compatible with the objectives of the directives in a proactive way.