Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

I did not interrupt the Minister. I am prepared to stand the criminal justice system on its head if that is what is necessary but I have not had the evidence from the Minister that the pivotal measure in this Bill will make it more effective.

Deputy O'Donnell asked the Minister to deal with the distinction between witnesses and jurors. All the Minister said was that it would be folly to seek to draw distinctions. There is a major distinction because at the Special Criminal Court one must still provide witnesses. The Minister invited Members to watch "The Week in Politics" on Sunday night, when the State solicitor from Limerick, Mr. Michael Murray, appeared. What the Minister quoted does not say what the Minister suggested. Mr. Murray was confronted by a live video of Deputy Willie O'Dea, admittedly a challenge at any time, and asked if he agreed with him. He replied:

The Minister is well known for walking the streets of Limerick and is out every given hour that he has at the weekends. I am not going to contradict the Minister because, in fairness to him, if anybody knows what is going on on the streets of Limerick, he does. I cannot say I have any evidence of widespread intimidation.[...] I have not seen a lot of evidence of intimidation of jurors. In the recent past I have come across one case where a jury was quite clearly frightened and had been intimidated. As a result of that I asked the gardaí to investigate the matter.

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