Mr. Declan Smyth:

I will answer the second of the Deputy's questions. There are two ways in which the matter could come before the Court of Justice: one is if the Commission itself instituted infringement procedures against Ireland for having breached European Union law. A series of correspondence would be exchanged between the Commission and Ireland, and assuming an infringement procedure was initiated, it would involve a request that the legislation would be repealed or at least suspended or not applied.

The other way in which the matter might come before the Court of Justice is, if having passed, and a person was then, for instance, to be prosecuted or goods were to be stopped at customs, the owner of the goods or the person to be prosecuted might challenge that and it may then ultimately end up by way of preliminary reference for a ruling on a point of European Union law before the Court of Justice. That may have the same consequence.