David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael)
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I move amendment No. 9:

In page 10, between lines 17 and 18, to insert the following:“Amendment of section 139(2) of Legal Services Regulation Act 2015

11. Section 139(2) of the Legal Services Regulation Act 2015 is amended—

(a) by the substitution, for “The Minister may”, of “The Government may”, and

(b) in paragraph (b), by the substitution, for “that the Minister, with the consent of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, determines”, of “as the Government determine”.”.

The Office of the Attorney General has advised that this amendment to section 139(2) is required in order to rectify a discrepancy arising from the language used in that section in its current form. Basically, it is a technical amendment. The effect of the proposed amendment is to confirm, for consistency and legal clarity, that the Chief Legal Costs Adjudicator and the legal costs adjudicators being referred to may be appointed by the “Government’. This should remove any legal ambiguity that might otherwise arise from that section's current use of the word "Minister".