Legislation to tackle rip-off culture ‘on track’

THE Government yesterday insisted that planned legislation, aimed at giving the National Consumer Agency (NCA) powers to tackle the rip-off Ireland culture, remained on track.

Yesterday marked the first anniversary of the announcement by Enterprise Minister Micheál Martin of the NCA and its 12-strong interim board members.

But it could be later this year before the new agency is granted a statutory footing.

One of the original board members, Carmel Foley, has since resigned the position and also her role as Director of Consumer Affairs in February when she was invited on to the Garda Ombudsman Commission.

Her role at the ODCA was filled by John Shine, who himself is interim director of the ODCA.

A spokesperson for the minister’s department said yesterday that a full-time board would be in place as soon as the legislation required to give it a statutory footing was completed and implemented.

A spokesperson said that members of the interim board would be expected to stay on once it was given statutory powers.

She added that many of those involved in drafting the heads of a new bill were also responsible for the abolition in law of the Groceries Order which was described as “time consuming”.

A department spokesperson said Mr Martin will bring the heads of the new bill before the Dáil by the end of the month.

The heads of the bill, incorporating up to 70 different elements, will then be published with the hope of implementing the new legislation later this year.

Board member Dr Edward Shinnick of the Department of Economics at University College Cork said those on the panel had been made aware that drafting the required legislation was a lengthy process.

“There are lots of different laws and they want to form it into one consolidated piece of legislation,” he said.

“That will always take some time and they need to get it right — I think it’s a reasonable trade-off.”