Michael Kitt (Fianna Fail)

This section was inserted on Committee Stage in the Dáil. Acts of the European Community and European Union, normally directives and regulations but also the treaties of the European Community, are often referred to in Acts of the Oireachtas and statutory instruments. From time to time, these regulations and directives are revoked and made again with or without modification. The question arises as to what effect a revocation has on references in our Acts and statutory instruments to these European references.

It was hoped that the section currently in the Bill as passed by the Dáil would address this issue. However, most references are to directives and the majority of these are given effect by ministerial regulation made under the European Communities Act 1972. The regulation making powers in that Act are contained in section 3. In its application to European directives, it is limited to giving effect to the directive and "...may contain such incidental, supplementary and consequential provisions as appear to the Minister making the regulations to be necessary for the purposes of the regulations...".

If replacing a directive makes material modifications, as many do, to what had been provided by the earlier directive and the earlier directive had been augmented by regulations made under the 1972 Act, those ministerial regulations may not be capable of being kept alive simply by means of the device provided for by section 28 of the Bill. The scope of the regulatory power that the Minister concerned can exercise to give effect to the new directive could have increased or decreased in comparison with the corresponding power that was exercised to give effect to earlier directives. On that basis, it is better to address this issue on a case-by-case basis, rather than provide generally for it in the Interpretation Act. If there is a cross-reference in another Act to a Council directive, we want it to refer to the new Act. As we implement directives by ministerial regulations, we have to implement them fully.