Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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Gabhaim buíochas leis an gCathaoirleach agus le rúnaíocht an choiste as ucht an chruinnithe seo.. I thank the Chair and secretariat for facilitating our meeting today. I am delighted to be joined by my colleagues: Dr. Eamonn Cahill, principal officer; Ms Carol Toolan, assistant principal officer; and Mr. Matthew Geoghegan, administrative officer. They put all the work into the Bill. We appreciate that. As I said on Second Stage, the Bill will repeal and replace the Control of Exports Act 2008 and ensure that Ireland continues to operate a robust framework for regulating the export of controlled items, particularly dual-use and military items.

Export controls are a multilateral, global mechanism that contribute to international peace and security and seek to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Controls take the form of a legal obligation on exporters to obtain prior authorisation, that is, an export licence, to export designated items to other countries. The current Act must be updated to reflect the significant advances in technology, new developments in business practices, updates to EU instruments and the evolving and evolved geopolitical risk landscape.

Deputies will recall from Second Stage that the Bill aims to ensure that Ireland has a sound legal basis for administering export controls by providing for controls related to dual-use items; controls related to military items; the establishment of a national military export control list; rules and conditions for obtaining and using authorisations; establishment of an independent adjudication panel to hear appeals and disclosure requests; an effective enforcement capability for authorised officers; the establishment of a comprehensive set of offences for infringements of the controls; and proportionate, graduated and dissuasive penalties for breaches.

I acknowledge the broad support for the Bill thus far in the Dáil and look forward to today's meeting. My amendments are predominantly technical, typographical or punctuation corrections. I thank Deputy O'Reilly for her amendments.