Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

It is right for the democratically elected representatives of the people to select our judges. It would be better if they were choosing between three people but, ultimately, that power should reside here. It has served us well, by and large, in the history of the State with the exception of the past two Governments. It is with regret that I have to come back to what Deputy Howlin said.

10 o’clock

Those in the legal world would have a view that the hostility in the relationship between the previous Government and the judicial system was unprecedented. The key point in respect of appointments by that Government was, as Deputy Mattie McGrath said, two for Fine Gael, one for Labour - not on every occasion, but that was the basic arithmetic. Many of them were very good but the word I hear from people involved in the system is that we have not lived up to the tradition of the State in terms of really good judicial appointments.

I am afraid there are flaws in the statement by the Minister, Deputy Flanagan. In fact, we could drive a coach and four through it. I want to raise some specific points that have not been addressed. First, he stated that all necessary procedures regarding judicial appointment have been followed in this instance. While I am not an expert, we had experience in government for four years during which there were quite a large number of judicial appointments. On every single occasion, they came through JAAB and through the Attorney General's office. If there was a conflict of interest, that had to be taken account and measured in the process. Critically, and this is a political point, the Minister stated that we cannot discuss what happened in this process because of Cabinet confidentiality. I am sorry, but at the heart of this process there is one aspect that is different to anything I experienced. During our time in government, we, as a minority party, were involved in every single judicial appointment. We were fully informed and had the opportunity to agree or disagree. This was not in Cabinet - we did not have a debate in Cabinet. We decided before the relevant Cabinet meeting whether we agreed or disagreed or were happy with the names going forward.

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