Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

It related to whether the person did not have to be held in custody for the purpose of being sent to another state.

The principle of the European arrest warrant is that one is deprived of one's liberty for the purpose of putting oneself somewhere else. I have no doubt that someone who is faced with a European arrest warrant could possibly informally contact the police on the other side and say "I'm coming to Paris anyway, forget about this" and by agreement there might be no further proceedings on the arrest warrant. Somebody who wants to get to the requesting state in those circumstances will not be prevented from coming to an agreement with that state to forget about proceedings in the Irish High Court because the person will turn up in Warsaw, Paris, Madrid or wherever he or she is wanted.

If push comes to shove and the Irish State is pushed to the point of saying in respect of an accused person that it wants that person in Madrid tomorrow and that person has contested the accusation all the way down the line to that point, the Irish court effectively has to deprive that person of his or her liberty. The idea is that the accused person is surrendered in custody to the other state and it is for the other state, in terms of its law, to decide whether that person is set at liberty or to take an interlocutory decision about his or her status, pending trial in that state.

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