Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)

Tá mé ag labhairt ar leasú Uimh. 9 agus á mholadh. Ba chóir go ndéanfaimis gach aon rud dár féidir linn le déanamh cinnte de go bhfuil an oiread cosanta agus is féidir ó thaobh cearta de acu siúd a bhfuil an Stát chun déileáil leo.

The purpose of this amendment is similar to that of Deputy Costello but goes slightly further in proposing an additional safeguard against the State executing judgments from countries with unfair judicial systems. It is important to clearly allot this discretionary role to the High Court from the outset, especially given the absence of human rights criteria with regard to the absolute discretion of the Minister for Foreign Affairs in designating countries for the purposes of this Act. Orders by the Minister designating countries under this Bill as currently drafted are laid before both Houses after they have been made. Accordingly, the High Court should have a role in this respect to ensure that proper account is taken of monitoring regime change and changes in judicial and detention standards in the designated countries. A country may be designated by the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the situation in that country might improve or get worse in the intervening time. This Bill does not make provision for a review of the designated country status.

Likewise, the criteria governing the decisions by the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform in these cases on whether to grant consent to a designated country to a request that a sentence be served in this country are gravely lacking from a human rights perspective. Elements of this legislation are not unlike the disgraceful decisions made by the Minister when he introduced immigration legislation in this House last year, whereby a number of countries were deemed to be safe. One of those is Nigeria, where every year, hundreds of people die at the hands of police officers.

We need to ensure that the designating of countries can be reviewed. The current list of designated countries includes some which have not come up to the mark in terms of conditions of detention. Georgia has been cited by various groups, in particular by the UN Committee Against Torture, which said the detention conditions in Georgia are akin to torture. Other listed countries have still to rise to the EU mark set under the Copehagen Treaty, though they are making progress, and in the future might reach the standards we expect in our own judicial system. The powers in this regard are given to the Minister, but the onus and power should be shifted to reside with the High Court, so that it would give explicit guidance relating to the quality of the judicial process in those designated countries, the quality of the detention centres or prisons, or whatever places in which sentenced persons are to be held. Considering that Irish citizens could be held in these conditions abroad, and people would be placed in prisons in this State, we must ensure that proper due process and the judicial process in the designated countries are up to the standards set out in legislation in this House.

Given that the Bill does not make provision for the sentenced person's right to make representations to the Minister as to why he should not grant consent, there should be the opportunity of recourse to the High Court for a decision on the designated countries, and to ensure that the High Court can make such a determination. There might be a role for the proposed new European human rights agency discussed last week at the Joint Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights. That agency might look into human rights conditions in various European countries but could perhaps also be requested by states, or the Minister or the High Courts of those states, to investigate the standards in various countries.

The High Court would provide an opportunity to be open and transparent about how such decisions are reached. The person affected would have an opportunity to put his or her case too. This would take pressure off the Minister, whether it be the Minister for Foreign Affairs, in terms of designating a country, or the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, so that he or she would be fully aware of the facts. The High Court is where this decision should rest.

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