George Lawlor (Wexford, Labour)
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Yes. Much of this is new to me. When I joined the enterprise committee, copyright was not the first thing I thought I would be discussing from a voting point of view. It appears to me from all this, however, that there seems to be much ambiguity here. We are a nation of performers and artists yet the imbalance is being directed towards the superpowers of the producers in many ways.

The waiving of pre-legislative scrutiny is a shame. I have sat in this committee several times and you would nearly want a senior counsel alongside you at some of the meetings, such is the degree of detail involved. I have to say I am disappointed some of the amendments to date have not been taken on board. In my view, they wave a little more in favour of the performers and assist them in a way I believe we as a country should be assisting them. We are not a country of superpowers in production or producers but we are a country of performers, artists and people who bring much to the table. That is what we are renowned for. We as a committee should be focusing on ensuring we weigh in behind the performers to a greater extent.

That is just my observation on it.