Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

We are; last year, we added 11 more. We have been trying to reduce the number of regulators in recent years. Instead of appointing new regulators, we have been trying to assign new duties. Many of the existing regulatory authorities are local authorities such as urban councils. However, there are too many in terms of trying to do business or answer to them.

I do not have precise figures on the number of OECD report recommendations that have been implemented. However, although all the recommendations have not been completed, action has commenced in all of the areas. All of the work on regulatory impact analysis has been done. That work is almost concluded across most of the professional areas.

The Competition Authority completed a report on the engineering profession in December 2004. The report on the architects' profession was completed in March 2006. The report on the optometry profession was completed in June 2006. The report on the legal profession was completed in December 2006. A preliminary report on the dental profession was published in December 2005 and a final report is due later this year. A preliminary report on veterinary surgeons will be published this year. The final profession awaiting a report is medical practitioners and this is due in 2008. Reports on all of the major areas that required focus will be finished by next year.

I did not refer to progress on the reform of the legal profession. The Tánaiste and Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform announced the establishment on a statutory basis of a legal services ombudsman to provide for independent statute-based supervision of the complaints system for both solicitors and barristers. The Civil Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill includes required provisions to establish a legal services ombudsman. While work has not been fully completed, it has commenced in most of the areas. Much work has been done on the decision-making processes of regulators. The Deputy's question was on regulators. The Enterprise Strategy Group published a report — Ahead of the Curve, Ireland's Place in the Global Economy — and made suggestions on how best we could deal with regulators and the idea of a super-regulator. This raised the question of the best way to address this. The Director of Consumer Affairs, the Competition Authority and the White Paper are examining this but the matter is not so simple. The report made the point that some regulations are minor whereas others, to do with building power stations, are wide. The best way of dealing with it has yet to be teased out. We cannot continue appointing regulators willy-nilly. It must be tightened and, to get expertise, perhaps we should create expert offices that can deal with a broad range of areas.

See this speech in context