Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will begin with a technical point. We have been asked today to approve Ireland's opt-in to two Council decisions and a Council regulation. We had much debate after the initial failure of the Lisbon treaty on how we would deal with secondary legislation coming from the European Union. We spend a lot of time on statements in the House but this is lawmaking and we do not give enough attention to it. I do not say this as a criticism of the Business Committee. There used to be a formal committee on secondary legislation. We are making law almost on the nod here. We are dealing with three very disparate issues and I have five minutes to deal with them. We need to have faith with the people to whom we gave commitments on how we deal with secondary legislation. It is not only with regard to secondary legislation. It is also how we deal with pre-Council and post-Council statements. We might have some time to reflect on how we deal with all of this. The undermining of people's confidence in the European institutions is something to which we should always be alert.

I want to deal with the three specific proposals. The first deals with sharing DNA profiles and fingerprint data with the United Kingdom. It is to be dealt with under the trade and co-operation agreement. Last week we dealt with Prüm regulation changes that expanded the agreed formulation whereby we share DNA and fingerprint data and brought in facial recognition. At that stage I asked about the role of the United Kingdom post Brexit in all of this. I was told it was coming and it has come very quickly. The motion extends co-operation between the United Kingdom and EU on DNA and fingerprint data. I would like to hear more about vehicle registration data. Will this continue to be shared? Presumably, since there is no mention of the extension of the Prüm regulation to facial recognition, it is not encompassed. These are points of detail I would like to have had the time to have teased out in a more substantial way. Perhaps it is a role for the committee system. The mechanism for transposition should be a matter for the House as well as for the Department and not for the Department simply to say this is the way it will transpose and present it.

The next issue I want to raise is the more nebulous issue of the Kyoto Declaration on Advancing Crime Prevention, Criminal Justice and the Rule of Law. This is a non-binding, high-level commitment aimed at strengthening collective efforts related to crime prevention. In essence, we are being asked to support a statement of intent that imposes no specific obligations on us as I understand it. I understood the Minister for Justice wanted to go to the Kyoto conference and make a statement. Everybody will now abide by the good intentions to co-operate more vigorously in the fight against crime. This is a wonderful thing. I take it there is no substantial legislative impact on this opt-in so obviously it is not of as much significance as the other proposals.

The other issue is the opt-in to technical updates to the insolvency regulation. This is rather more substantial. The recast insolvency regulation applies to company insolvency, personal insolvency and bankruptcy. It provides for mutual recognition and enforcement of insolvency proceedings between EU member states in cases where a cross-border dimension arises. It sets out an agreed set of common procedures, including which particular member state's courts will have jurisdiction and which member state's national insolvency laws will apply. It will ensure court orders made under the rules will be recognised in all member states. These are matters of significance and substance when it comes to our citizens who are involved in insolvency procedures. When we recast an insolvency regulation such as this, it certainly has a real and tangible impact on the people we represent. I would have liked a little bit more time to tease out specifically how the regulation and these negotiated alterations are to apply.

In general terms, having read the briefing documents we received from the Department, I have no difficulty in supporting the three resolutions for opt-in that have been presented to us today. Perhaps it is something the Ceann Comhairle might reflect upon. We could do secondary European business in a better way than this in my judgment.

See this speech in context