Bill Proposing Amendment to Irish Arbitration Act Published in Ireland

On 4 July 2025, the General Scheme of the <span class="news-text_italic-underline">Arbitration (Amendment) Bill 2025</span> (the “<span class="news-text_medium">Bill</span>”) was published, proposing significant changes to the Irish <span class="news-text_italic-underline">Arbitration Act 2010</span> (“<span class="news-text_medium">AA 2010</span>”). If enacted, the new legislation will be titled the <span class="news-text_italic-underline">Arbitration (Amendment) Act 2025</span> and will enable Ireland to give effect to investment protection agreements to which the state becomes a party.

Investment protection agreements allow investors to pursue <span class="news-text_medium">binding arbitration</span> as an alternative to domestic court proceedings in the host country. The purpose of such agreements is to provide a faster and more neutral method of resolving disputes.

The Bill follows the Irish Supreme Court’s decision in <span class="news-text_medium"><span class="news-text_italic-underline">Costello v Government of Ireland [2022] IESC 44</span></span>, which ruled that Ireland could not ratify the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (“<span class="news-text_medium">CETA</span>”) without legislative amendments.

Key features of the proposed amendment include:

• Empowering the <span class="news-text_medium">Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade</span> to prescribe, by Order, an investment protection agreement to which the AA 2010 will apply.
• Providing arbitral awards made under such agreements may be enforced in Ireland as if they were <span class="news-text_medium">New York Convention</span> or <span class="news-text_medium">ICSID Convention</span> awards.
• Clarifying the <span class="news-text_medium">Irish High Court</span> will refuse enforcement of awards would “materially compromise the constitutional order of the State or the autonomy of the legal order of the European Union”.

If enacted, the legislation will pave the way for Ireland to ratify CETA and other free trade agreements with countries such as Singapore, Vietnam, Chile and Mexico, creating new trading opportunities while offering investors greater security and legal certainty.