OECD Regulatory Policy Outlook 2025

There has been little change in Ireland’s Better Regulation agenda in recent years. Ireland still conducts mandatory regulatory impact assessment (RIA) for major primary laws and subordinate regulations. RIAs are required to include a variety of social, economic and environmental impacts and some are published on the central government’s website.

Following various Open Government Partnership National Action Plans, Ireland had committed to improving consultation by public bodies with citizens, civil society and others. Despite some improvements, consultation practices do not yet operate on a systematic basis across government departments. Progress on developing a single central government website for public consultations seems to have stalled, with only some ongoing consultations published on the beta-version website. As Ireland develops the tools to conduct more transparent and open stakeholder engagement, public consultation could be applied more systematically to a broader range of draft regulations, particularly for subordinate regulations.

Standing orders from Parliament state that the minister responsible for implementing a law must provide an assessment of its functioning within a year. In addition, sectoral departments are required to enact policy and conduct reviews at least every seven years according to the Policy Statement on Economic Regulation. Ireland introduced sunsetting clauses in some of the subordinate regulations relating to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Various aspects of the Better Regulation agenda sit across a number of departments, with the Department of the Taoiseach, along with the Office of the Attorney General, having a role in relation to transparency and the quality of regulation; the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform leading on public service modernisation, development and reform functions (including in relation to RIA) and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment leading on administrative burdens and competition issues. Responsibility rests with each department to ensure adherence with the 'Regulating Better' principles as set out by government and ensure the effective oversight of regulatory bodies under their aegis.