Mr. Liam Herrick:

I thank the Deputy for her questions. As we previously stated on more than one occasion, the ICCL is very clear that we have immense regard for the quality of the judges who sit on our courts now and for those who have sat on them over the years. We do not think there is any incompatibility between believing that we get good results, by and large, from the current system but also wanting to improve and strengthen the system for the future.

On the specific question about how the judicial membership might be composed and how the questions and so on would be conducted, Senator McDowell has already asked questions about how the body corporate would be constituted. I understand from Mr. Condon that it will be addressed in the Bill. Our suggestion is that all the judicial members nominated by the Judicial Council and those acting on behalf of the appropriate court would be elected by all members of the Judiciary. The thinking behind that is it would strengthen the authority and legitimacy of the idea of these people acting on behalf of all judges. It would also avoid a potential danger - not one that we believe is manifest - of having a clique of the senior members of the Judiciary that would dominate the judicial input and that would not represent the Judiciary as a whole. That is our suggestion on that point.

On the question of ranking, we are talking about a selection process. No matter how it is constructed, it will involve choices and preferences. There are two elements to what we suggest. The first is ranking, which strengthens independence, and the other is reducing the number of names that goes to the Government. The two should be seen as going hand in hand. Both would make a contribution towards strengthening, and of course either could be done separately from the other. Both would have the effect of strengthening the independence of the process.