I move amendment No. 3: In page 3, to delete lines 11 to 13. I will be pressing this amendment.
Sentiment score: -0.10
This amendment will delete section 2. Section 2 inserts a number of references to the new section 25A which would be inserted into the Arbitration Act 2010 under section 4 of this Bill. A separate amendment to delete that subsection itself has, unfortunately, been ruled out of order. The new section 25A provides that awards made pursuant to Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, CETA, and the Chile-EU Advanced Framework Agreement would be enforceable in Ireland in the same manner as a judgment or order of the High Court. We in the Labour Party have been clear throughout the passage of this Bill through the Oireachtas, and indeed before, that we were opposed to trade agreements that include investor court systems, which have a massive potential to undermine social and environmental regulations. We recognise the importance of an outward-looking Ireland trading with the world, particularly in the midst of global uncertainty as we have seen in recent years in the face of tariffs, war and other major disruptions. Trade agreements with the wider world are, of course, important but we need to recognise that CETA has been successfully implemented on a provisional basis for years now without the investor court. It is worth noting at the outset, in the short time we have for the debate this evening, that Canada has agreed to remove the investor court system from the renegotiated North American Free Trade Agreement with the United States and Mexico. Investor courts are an outdated system and are not needed between modern trading blocs and modern states. It is a one-way system. States cannot sue companies in investor state arbitrations. The first question that needs to be answered is why EU and Canadian investors would not trust their own local court system. This was well aired on Committee Stage and has had huge interest from academics, politicians and civil society questioning, without a proper answer, why the investor court system remains so implacably defended by this Government. We have discussed this at length during the Bill's passage but we know from experience that investor court state claims have the effect of inhibiting the ability of domestic governments to pass legislation addressing public concerns such as health, environmental protection, labour rights and human rights. Examples like this were seen in Canada in 2013 when Lone Pine Resources Inc. filed a $250 million Canadian dollar damages claim against Canada under the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, over Quebec's moratorium on fracking. These claims have a regulatory chilling effect on governments, leaving them hamstrung. That is what a Canadian mining company has done under the previous NAFTA agreement when an investor court system has been in place. Now we are going to walk headlong into the same system, putting our State's economic, social and environmental security at risk. This is at the heart of our opposition to this and at the heart of our opposition to the amendment.
Sentiment score: 0.21
It is worth clarifying that we know the difference between an ISDS system and an investor court system. There is not much of a difference. The investor court system really formalises the previous ISDS system, but in effect they do the same thing. We have had this at committee. It was an absolute disgrace that we did not have pre-legislative scrutiny on this. It was remiss of me to not commend Lynn Boylan on the briefing she arranged a couple of months ago, as referred to by Deputy Ó Laoghaire, which Deputy Gibney and others were present at. That should have taken place in a committee room as part of pre-legislative scrutiny of this Bill. The Minister of State keeps saying that we are scaremongering when we can point to examples of where Canadian companies have sued states. We can point to examples within Europe where a German energy company sued the Netherlands for its decarbonisation policy and the impact that was having on its business. We can also point to the fact that there is a threat here because Canadian pensions funds are heavily in the Irish energy system, not just in renewables but in oil and gas in Corrib and Whitegate. The Canadians are heavily invested in the Irish energy sector in fossil fuels. That is not to take into account hypotheticals that could come with regard to our housing system if that changed towards a more public system and Canadian pension funds had investments in private housing, which some of them do. The Minister of State accuses us of scaremongering even though we have seen the investor court system in action being used by Canadian mining companies and others. He is saying we are saying black is white but we can throw that right back at him because we have the examples and we are highlighting a valid threat from what is an outdated, outmoded system that is not needed between two modern trading blocs. It is absolutely unbelievable.
Sentiment score: -0.07
I move amendment No. 4: In page 3, to delete lines 14 to 18.
Sentiment score: -0.15
I move amendment No. 11: In page 4, to delete lines 3 to 13. This amendment would delete subsection (2) of the new section 25A, to be inserted to the Arbitration Act 2010 under section 4 of the Bill. The purpose of the amendment is to allow us time to consider whether subsection (4)(2) of the new section 25A is compatible with agreements such as CETA. If CETA or any other international agreement like it was to be ratified by Ireland and all other member states, it would then become EU law. We cannot then rely on our own constitutional protections as Article 29.4 makes clear. This subsection therefore does not make sense. It is asking us to rely on a constitutional protection that ultimately will not be there. What is more is that investors will be able to simply step outside of the jurisdiction without going to the lengths of arguing whether there are any legitimate limitations as the enforceability of their claims and that is why we are proposing the deletion of subsection 4(2) with this amendment.
Sentiment score: 0.09
We did not have much time to debate this even on Committee Stage. The Minister of State accused us of putting forward hypotheticals to scaremonger even though we are basing them on a number of cases that have taken place internationally. He has constantly told us that X, Y and Z have to happen, ultimately this is really rare and probably will not happen anyway so what is the big worry but this is going to happen. The ICS will come in under this and we will be vulnerable. It is a risk we do not have to take because we have a modern, trusted Judiciary that is well capable of determining cases if a company feels the State has acted with a degree of malevolence to impact its ability to make profits. There is a system for a grievance to be taken against the State, should a company want to do so. That is the system in which we believe. We do not believe in an investor court system. We are not scaremongering; we are basing it on evidence of a system that is rooted in a mid-20th century system where the rich global north was exploiting the poor global south and did not trust their judiciary systems so they set up the ISDS system, which ultimately became the ICS. The corporates have codified and formalised that and have put enough pressure on the EU, Canada and everyone else to ensure that this system must be included in trade deals. It is a system that is fundamentally wrong especially when we have modern, trusted, transparent judiciaries like we have in this country. That is where we are coming from.
Sentiment score: -0.07