Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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89. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality the number and dates of meetings of the Justice and Home Affairs Council of the European Union attended by her and/or by officials in her Department since the start of 2014; the number and dates of DAPIX meetings attended by officials in her Department since the start of 2014 where there were discussions on the proposed EU general data protection regulation; the progress that has been made in finalising the regulation since the last Irish EU Presidency; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37338/14]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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Since the start of 2014 there have been four meetings of the Justice and Home Affairs Council. This includes two 'informal' meetings of Ministers for Justice and Home Affairs.

My predecessor, Mr Alan Shatter T.D., was represented at the 'informal' meeting on 23-24 January by senior officials of the Department of Justice and Equality. He attended the formal Council meeting of 3-4 March. Since my appointment as Minister on 8 May 2014 there has been one formal JHA Council meeting on 5-6 June which I attended. I was represented by senior officials of my Department at the 'informal' Council meeting of 8-9 July.

As regards attendance at meetings of the Council's Dapix working group, the position is that officials of my Department have attended 12 meetings since 1 January 2014 (8-10 January; 20-21 January; 18-20 February; 12-13 March; 31 March-1 April; 10-11 April; 7-8 May; 14-15 May; 12 June; 10-11 July; 11-12 September; 30 September). As regards progress made in finalising the Regulation since the end of the Irish Presidency, the position is that while many of the Regulation's chapters have been discussed in detail, limited progress has been made towards achieving a general approach which would permit the opening of formal trilogue negotiations with the European Parliament.

At the June 2014 JHA Council meeting, the Hellenic Presidency achieved broad agreement on the contents of Chapter 5 of the Regulation, i.e. provisions concerning the transfer of personal data to third countries and international organisations. However this agreement was reached on the understanding that "nothing is agreed until everything is agreed". It does not therefore provide a basis for engaging in trilogue discussions with the European Parliament because further adjustments may be required in order to take account of agreements reached at a later stage on other chapters. The current Italian Presidency is hopeful that a similar level of agreement can be reached at next week's JHA Council meeting in relation to Chapter 4 of the Regulation which determines the compliance obligations on companies and other bodies which process personal data. While discussions at official level in relation to Chapter 4 are continuing, I am hopeful that Justice Ministers will be in a position to reach broad agreement on the contents of Chapter 4 at next week's meeting.