Frances Black warns bill could ban Palestinian goods by mistake

Thank you, Cathaoirleach. Minister, there are many issues to be dealt with today, as we all know, including the most substantial one of trade and services, which we will get to, I know, in good time. The first set is more technical, but it is very important, and the aim here is to ensure that no Palestinian goods are accidentally captured by this legislation. And I know, and I fully accept, that this is not the intention of the government. I listened closely to the debates on this point in the Dáil committee stage, but I do think it's important to get to it on the record of this house also. The government bill relies on a postcode system managed at EU level to identify illegal Israeli settlements, and the postcode list is updated regularly, and there's a clear logic to using it. However, as the government has accepted, it's not perfect. About 90% of the postcodes map directly onto an illegal Israeli settlement, but about 10% don't. So, and they may also include some Palestinian communities too, particularly in East Jerusalem, and that's the concern. Everyone here today agrees that these Palestinian communities who have seen their homes encircled by illegal settlements and who face displacement nearly every single day should not be covered by this ban. This is not the intention of the legislation set out in its long title, and it's not what the government intends. I know it's not what the government intends, but regardless, what's written in the actual legislation, as we all know, really does matter. And how do we prevent this? And that's the question we must ask. To ensure that Palestinian goods are not accidentally captured, we would prefer that the legislation makes clear that it bans goods that meet two criteria instead of just one. First, that they are from a listed postcode, but second, that they are also produced in an Israeli settlement. And this is preferable to using the postcode system alone, which is a blunt tool. It's why my original Occupied Territories Bill was drafted differently and with great care, and I have to pay credit to Gerry Liston from GLAN and SIDACA for all their work on those elements, and not forgetting my own friend and colleague, Connor O'Neill, who has done phenomenal work, as we all know, on this issue. In Dahl Committee stage, the government responded to these concerns by stating that this isn't necessary because, for administrative reasons, Palestinian goods will simply be allowed through regardless of whether they are from a banned postcode. And I think that's really concerning. It's a concerning way of going about this, and I want to explain why, Minister. The logic is that Israeli exporters trade under the EU-Israeli Association Agreement, which governs trade with Israel, but Palestinian exporters trade under the EU-Palestinian Authority Trade Agreement, which governs trade with Palestine, because the latter agreement uses different administrative arrangements and doesn't require Palestinian exporters to list the illegal settlements postcodes in the same way. The government has stated that customs officials will simply not seize the products because they won't have a banned postcode printed on the important documentation on the box, et cetera. And I accept that, in practice, this is likely, but the fact of the matter is that it's still basically ignoring rather than applying the law. Regardless of whether the customs officials seize the goods or not, by a literal reading of the bill, those Palestinian products would be banned by statute. And this is what the bill states very clearly. Section five says, and I quote that, the importation of goods originating in a postal code to which this act applies is prohibited. And there's a distinction made here. It doesn't matter what trade deal you export them under, what is printed on the box, where the community is from, the statute says that any goods originating in a specific geographic area, i.e., the postcodes, are banned. So effectively, we would be banning all goods from these postal codes, but then working on the basis that Palestinian goods will slip through the net because they won't be marked with a relevant code on the box and thus won't be seized. But they will still, by statute, be banned. And I'm not trying to be pedantic here, Minister, and I think this is genuinely concerning, and I know I've spoken to you this, personally. We have precedent in other jurisdictions of what can happen. And would anyone be surprised if opponents of Palestinian rights tried to make use of this ambiguity in the law? That's the question. Imagine that a scarf or a bottle of olive oil from a Palestinian community in one of these postcodes is indeed allowed to enter Ireland. And as the Minister says, it won't be seized by officials. It is then placed for sale in a shop here. And what's stopping any individual from asking that it be removed from the shelf on the basis that under Section 5 of this bill and under the Customs Act, as amended, it is banned? Surely the Minister accepts that they would have at least a plausible case by a literal reading of the law. So we must remember that this bill amends the existing Customs Act 2015. It therefore does not just ban on the imports of goods, but also, and I quote, the possession, custody of transport, deposit, or otherwise dealing with any banned goods. So as such, like the original Occupied Territories Bill, it bans their importation, but also their handling and sale. So it will be an offense to sell that bottle of Palestinian olive oil if it comes from a listed postcode, regardless of how it arrives into the country or what's printed on the box. We are therefore proposing a straightforward, workable amendment that would leave no doubt and solve the issue based on precedent in the proposed government legislation in the Netherlands and in Belgium, apply a two-test section on the goods before banning them instead of using the postal codes alone. So I don't see any good reason why we would do this and not leave a clear ambiguity in the law. Gerardo.