Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)

I move amendment No. 4:

In page 8, to delete lines 19 to 42, to delete page 9 and in page 10, to delete lines 1 to 9.

In this amendment I propose the deletion of section 10. Section 10 intends the deletion and substitution of section 13 from the 2003 Act. The original section 14 is preferable to the one proposed here and that is why I propose its deletion. Under the original provision an alert meant the document that indicates that an European arrest warrant had been issued by a judicial authority and, where the subject had not been convicted of the offence, a statement by the judicial authority confirming that a decision to charge and try the individual had been made. Under the current provision, gardaí may arrest a person on the basis of an alert, before they have an EU arrest warrant, only where they believe on reasonable grounds the person is likely to leave the State before the arrest warrant can be provided.

The substitution defines an alert as that which appears on the Schengen Information System. The express requirement that was in the previous act of judicial authorisation in the originating country and the requirement for urgency are both removed. The original section required the gardaí to inform the person arrested immediately of his or her right to consent to be surrendered. The new section removes that ability for the person. This might lead to court time being unnecessarily taken up with people who are happy to be surrendered.

The original section also provided that the High Court must direct the release of the person if the EU arrest warrant is not produced within seven days, whereas the new section has extended this to 14 days. This extension of detention is unwarranted given that the gist of the rest of the Bill is to modernise the mechanisms for communication in light of new technologies. If anything, there is less excuse for delays in the production of the necessary documentation. The increase from seven to 14 days is not warranted, given new technologies.

In general, section 10 is to have the same impact as an European arrest warrant and there is a real danger that innocent people will be deprived of their liberty for up to two weeks due to the proven inability of some law-enforcement agencies across the globe to ensure the data on their central databases is accurate and updated. Alerts may issue where arrest warrants do not exist. This section of the Bill provides that the alert on the Schengen Information System will be equivalent to an EU arrest warrant. It will give rise to automatic Garda power of arrest without warrant, and then the High Court can remand the person in custody for 14 days prior to the production of the warrant to which the alert relates. That is if a warrant exists, given the dangers of inaccurate data. The scope for error on the Schengen Information System and the implications of the errors are grave, so we must be careful where we extend the period during which we can deprive people of their liberty.

When the Schengen Information System was operating in only 13 countries, there were 125,000 access points. If it is to be extended across all member states and, potentially, across the new common security areas with the United States and others, we are talking about almost 500,000 access points. The greater the number of access points, the more people have access and the greater chance data might be lost, stolen, corrupted or whatever else. We must bear that in mind when we extend the period of detention. I propose that we delete section 10 and remain with the existing section 14 of the 2003 Act.

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