James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

For a long time, the digital space was an emerging and new frontier that was a bit of a wild west at one stage. Thankfully, now a multitude of regulation is coming down the track. I am thinking of the Digital Services Act, which the Minister of State mentioned, the Digital Markets Act, the Data Governance Act, the AI directive, which we discussed in the context of the previous question, and the AI liability directive that is coming hot on the heels of that. Later in 2024 or in 2025, we will have the cyber resilience Act and the European health data space. A plethora of legislation and regulation is coming from Europe, which is very welcome and overdue in some cases.

There are also opportunities for Ireland in that. We have already established ourselves as the lead regulator for data protection. That also brings benefits not just for companies in Ireland but in attracting business to Ireland because companies can benefit from that one-stop-shop framework. If we have the European regulator under one Irish roof, it strengthens the attractiveness of the proposition of Ireland as a centre of excellence and a centre to locate and create jobs for those companies, many of which are already here. We can leverage that if we can put our best foot forward as a regulatory hub.

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