26 June 2023
ICCL calls on all parties in the Dáil to challenge amendment
The Government has added an amendment[1] at the final stages of a miscellaneous provisions bill[2] that would muzzle critics of the Data Protection Commission (DPC).
The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) is calling on all parties in the Dáil to challenge this amendment when it comes before them for final debate on Wednesday.
The Government’s amendment will gag people from speaking about how the DPC handles their complaint, and from speaking about how Big Tech firms or public bodies are misusing their data. Even information that is not “commercially sensitive” will no longer be utterable.
This will make it impossible for journalists to properly report on Ireland’s GDPR supervision of Big Tech firms that have their European headquarters here, including Google, Meta, Apple, Microsoft, and TikTok.
Speaking today, Dr Johnny Ryan, Senior Fellow with ICCL, said:
“Justice should be done in public. The DPC should be holding public GDPR hearings, as the Supreme Court's Zalewski Decision makes clear. Instead, the Government is attempting to make DPC decision making even more opaque. The DPC is already exempted from freedom of information rules that could have aided in its reform.
“Ireland's enforcement of the GDPR against Big Tech, and how it upholds the data rights of everyone in Europe, should not be the subject of eleventh-hour amendments inserted during the end-of-term legislative rush.
“We ask the Government why it wants to do this? And why has it attempted to do so in a last-minute amendment that evades proper scrutiny?”
If enacted, this amendment may further damage the proper flow of information between the DPC and its peers across the European Union, because the DPC will have the power to designate as confidential material that should be shared with other European authorities. ICCL is aware that the DPC is currently suing all other EU GDPR supervisory authorities (collectively, the European Data Protection Board) at Europe’s highest court.[3]
The amendment also creates a risk of conflict with imminent European law. The European Commission will soon propose a new regulation to harmonise the conduct of cross-border GDPR cases.
Notes for editors
Available for comment:
- Dr Johnny Ryan, Senior Fellow, ICCL
For media queries: ruth.mccourt@iccl.ie / 087 415 7162
End notes
[1] See Amendment 9, on p. 7, and reference to confidentiality in Amendment 18 on p. 11 in https://data.oireachtas.ie/ie/oireachtas/bill/2022/84/seanad/3/amendment/numberedList/eng/b84b22d-scnl.pdf
[2] Courts and Civil Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2022
[3] https://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=272367&pageIndex=0&doclang=EN&mode=lst&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=578414 and https://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=272364&pageIndex=0&doclang=EN&mode=lst&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=578414