Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

The Irish Council for Civil Liberties, ICCL, has described this Act as "the single biggest denial of fair trial rights in our legal system". It is completely correct and that is why People Before Profit will be opposing this, as we have consistently done. I would urge other parties to join us in opposing this, particularly the Green Party and Sinn Féin, which previously also opposed the extension. The UN Human Rights Committee, Amnesty International and even former President Mary Robinson have all spoken out about these extraordinary powers. They allow people to be locked up without the right to a trial by jury and without any actual evidence presented against them, just on the opinion of a garda. We have seen again and again major scandals, corruption and abuses of power in the Garda. Just remember how they lied about Maurice McCabe.

As I mentioned, in the past, both Green Party and Sinn Féin Deputies spoke out and opposed it. Last year, the Green Party, now in government, did a U-turn and backed it while Sinn Féin, after being pinned on it in the general election, said there was a review going on, got stuck on the fence and abstained. Scandalously, again, they are going to repeat that this year. It is disappointing and it is, frankly, cowardly, under the pressure of a little bit of criticism from the establishment political parties, to not do the right thing and vote against juryless trial, and to not vote against this massive abuse of civil liberties which Sinn Féin had traditionally voted against every single year until the pressure of last year. In government, is Sinn Féin going to allow the continuation of this abuse of human rights?

The Minister for Justice recently talked about the need to use this juryless court against so-called subversives. Who are these subversives she is talking about? We saw during the water charges revolt how gardaí admitted to tapping the phones of campaign organisers. Were campaigners opposing austerity taxes considered to be subversives? We have seen how the anti-Covid laws were used in the last year to threaten Debenhams workers and to ban taxi drivers' protests. Are workers fighting for their rights to be considered subversives? It is a warning to us all. If we give this State extraordinary powers, it will continue them and use them against the will of the many.

The central justification for the undemocratic and anti-civil liberties Special Criminal Court is the issue of jury intimidation. That justification does not stand.

No proof has been offered that this is a significant problem in our criminal justice system. If it is, there are abundant alternative approaches which do not subvert the fundamentals of democracy and equality before the law. The ICCL has offered a few examples, including anonymous juries, screening juries from public view, special protection for juries during trials, and video links for juries at different locations. These are not new ideas in Irish law. The uncommenced and now repealed Juries (Protection) Act 1929 had some of these protections. On top of that, witnesses still have to give evidence during trials in the Special Criminal Court and are therefore a possible target of intimidation. The Special Criminal Court was never needed, it is not needed now and it will not be needed in the future. We cannot claim ignorance of the undemocratic and authoritarian nature of this legislation and cannot pretend that alternatives to it do not exist.

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