Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)

I thank the Deputy. The establishment of the AI office of Ireland is a strategic initiative of this Government. I am delighted to have secured start-up funding of €1.4 million as part of budget 2026 for the office's establishment. The AI office will act as a central co-ordinating body for the implementation of the AI Act in Ireland and will also provide a focal point for the promotion and adoption of transparent and safe AI in Ireland to ensure that we fully capture the strategic opportunity that AI presents.

My officials, in collaboration with Departments across a range of sectors, are developing the general scheme of the regulation of artificial intelligence. This will provide the implementation and enforcement of the AI Act at national level in domestic legislation, including: the establishment of a new national AI office as an independent statutory entity which will act as the central co-ordinating authority for the Act; the empowerment of designated competent authorities with market surveillance regulation powers in accordance with the AI Act; provisions for co-operation among and the sharing of information across the national competent authorities; and the laying down of rules for penalties and other enforcement measures for non-compliance.

It is my intention to bring the general scheme to the Government over the coming weeks. There are provisions within it which will ensure that the transition from interim arrangements to a permanent statutory structure will be legally and operationally seamless. The general scheme will provide powers to decide on the date on which this will happen post the enactment of the legislation.

The distributed model agreed by the Government means that existing sectoral regulators will supervise and enforce the AI Act, supported centrally by the new AI office of Ireland. The national AI Act implementation committee, which chaired by the Minister of State, Deputy Niamh Smyth, which has responsibility for AI and on which officials from my Department sit, was established in February. In the intervening period, the committee has brought the designated market surveillance authorities, MSAs, together to work on agreeing an approach to prepare for the new enforcement role. Since they were designated in July, additional MSAs have joined the committee.

See this speech in context