Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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433. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation her plans to introduce measures to restrict private companies from providing access to official documents such as birth and death certificates at a marked-up price. [8545/20]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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It is not unlawful in itself for a business to charge a fee for providing access to official documents such as birth and death certificates that is higher than the fee charged by an official body for those documents. A business offering such a service must not however mislead consumers about its identity, services, charges or other relevant matters.

Section 55(1)(a) of the Consumer Protection Act 2007 provides that it is a prohibited commercial practice for a trader to make a representation that the trader has an approval, authorisation or endorsement that the trader does not have. Section 43(1) of the Act provides that a commercial practice is misleading if it involves the provision of false information in relation to a number of specified matters, including the nature, attributes, identity and status of the trader, and that information would be likely to cause the average consumer to make a purchasing decision which that consumer would not otherwise make. Section 43(2) provides that a commercial practice is misleading if it would be likely to cause the average consumer to be deceived or misled in relation to a number of specified matters, including the nature, attributes, identity and status of the trader, and to make a purchasing decision which that consumer would not otherwise make.  A trader who engages in a misleading commercial practice under sections 43(1), and 43(2) of the Act, or a prohibited commercial practice under section 55(1) of the Act, commits an offence. Section 46(1) of the Act provides that a commercial practice is misleading if the trader omits or conceals material information that the average consumer would need to make an informed purchasing decision and that practice would be likely to cause the average consumer to make a purchasing decision which that consumer would not otherwise make.  Section 46(2) provides that a commercial practice is misleading if the trader provides material information in a manner that is unclear, unintelligible, ambiguous or untimely or fails to identify the commercial intent of the practice and that practice would be likely to cause the average consumer to make a purchasing decision which that consumer would not otherwise make. 

These provisions of the Consumer Protection Act 2007 are clearly applicable to so-called copycat websites which may be designed to look like the websites of official Government bodies and which do not make it clear that they are not official websites and that those who use their services may be paying for a service which they could obtain from an official body for free or for a lower charge.  Enforcement of the Act is the responsibility of the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission which is statutorily independent in the exercise of its enforcement functions. 

In many cases, consumers who use the services of private businesses that provide access to official documents do so after being routed to such businesses following a search on an internet search engine.  Directive (EU) 2019/2161 on the better enforcement and modernisation of European Union consumer protection rules which Member States must adopt by 28 November 2021 and apply from 28 May 2022 includes a number of provisions aimed at ensuring greater transparency in respect of online search results.  The Directive provides among other things that it will be a prohibited commercial practice for a trader to provide search results in response to a consumer’s online search query without clearly disclosing any paid advertisement or payment specifically for achieving higher ranking of products within the search results.