Ms Caoimhe de Barra:

One aspect of that, to be frank, is that Ireland is a country with a lot of small and medium-sized enterprises, so there is a degree of understandable nervousness regarding whether this would affect SMEs. Within supply chains, the principle is that you look at the entire supply chain and all industries and all sectors, but you do it in a proportionate manner, and if we have time, perhaps we could discuss what exactly that would look like. The principle is one of proportionality and maintaining that overall principle for all supply chains and all companies in a proportionate manner, as is set out in the UN guiding principles. That is fundamental.

There is a degree of reassurance that needs to happen regarding what it would mean to include SMEs in this. For example, a European Commission study recently found that the additional recurrent company-level costs of carrying out due diligence, as a percentage of SMEs’ revenues, would amount to less than 0.14%. In some ways, it is to take the fear and tension around the potential impact of this out of SMEs, put it on the table and discuss it in this forum, and enable the Government to take that leadership role, which so clearly belongs to the Government in this realm. That is the key.

To return to the point on directors' responsibility in response to Deputy Shanahan's point regarding consumers, if we make consumers responsible for driving change, we are negating all the responsibilities of states and companies. Directors taking responsibility for supply chain due diligence is the key.