Mr. Liam Herrick:

The European Union has instigated over the past number of years what it calls a rule of law reporting process, which monitors every state. We have made submissions in recent years that have highlighted challenges in the legislative process in this jurisdiction, for example, the rushing of legislation, the guillotining of legislation and not giving the Oireachtas the opportunity to properly consider important Bills. In our submission we have flagged that a number of issues are not addressed in the general scheme in its current form but may be introduced at later stages in the process. We feel that given the importance of this Bill and the complexity of the issues, it is essential that the committee has the opportunity to conduct pre-legislative scrutiny on all key matters included in the Bill. That is the key point that needs to be considered at this stage. One of the issues we raised, for example, is the continuing lack of clarity on the standards directive and what is going to happen to that. There is also the question the definition of gender and socio-economic status. There are many other issues. There is an important issue here for the integrity of the legislative process and empowering elected representatives to conduct their important work in an effective manner.