Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 21 October 2025
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence and the State: Discussion
2:00 am
Mr. Liam Herrick:
As an overview, there has not been a great deal of engagement so far by the Government with the Article 77 bodies or in convening some form of engagement between the Article 77 bodies and the Article 70 bodies and also around the question of the design of the national AI office. From our perspective, we would greatly welcome a much higher level of engagement with the Government and the other agencies. We are willing to do whatever we can to collaborate and co-operate more effectively. We are particularly interested in what the Government's intentions are with regard to the national AI office. We have not been party to any discussion about the design of that to date but we are clear it will be critical in the overall scheme of things. We have already made reference to the fact that in terms of our own specific role as an Article 77 body, we have convened informally the designated nine bodies to begin a conversation about what we all feel we might need. However, there is not any process of engagement with the Government at the moment about providing resources or, indeed, designing memorandums of understanding or whatever other tools might be needed to ensure effective co-operation either between us or between us and the other designated functions and mechanisms. Ms Keatinge might want to add to that.