Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)

I will be more flexible on amendment No. 63 but I thought the purpose of this amendment was clear enough because it is confined to the most serious cases. The Minister asked if a situation could arise whereby no trial is ever finished. In other words, when somebody is acquitted, there is always a possibility of coming back to the case. I do not think it is a bad thing for persons who have committed serious offences that they are never free of the shadow that their offence may catch up with them. Even if it never reaches their door, the notion that they walk out scot free is not just. The notion that the arm of the law might reach them at some stage is not a bad thing.

The Minister referred to the possibility of this provision being retrospective. It did not occur to me that this would be possible. I bow to the Minister's learned expertise in constitutional matters. I thought of it only operating from a current date. I am not sure whether it could operate retrospectively. If it could, I would support that notion. It does not mean that anybody who is acquitted for normal crimes would have a shadow hanging over them. It would only relate to those who have committed the most heinous crimes.

Let us take, for example, the case of a child murderer who was caught attempting to abduct a child subsequent to having been acquitted of a child murder. If some compelling evidence about the original murder surfaced, would people not be fearful and the country aghast that such an individual could not be made to answer for the crime?

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