Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

The Deputy is correct that I undertook on Committee Stage to examine this to see if there was a means of doing what he wanted. I do not disagree with the principle. I examined this carefully but all the advice is that it would be difficult to implement in this type of legislation for a range of reasons, particularly the difficulty in establishing the turnover of the company, the skills sets needed to ascertain that within timeframes and so on.

I also indicated having studied the possibilities relating to the percentage rule that the better approach would be to wait until the consolidation of the merchant shipping legislation is undertaken in the Department and then to apply severe penalties uniformly across the new statute. I have undertaken to do this. It would not be feasible or practical at this stage to go the route the Deputy has outlined. I agree with the principle underpinning the amendments. Severe fines should be in place for offences under this section but it is not possible to do that in the manner outlined by the Deputy.

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