Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Two dozen. Apologies. This is not something that will be applied where I or any other Minister think that somebody is not our kind of person. The reasons a person would have his or her citizenship revoked are clear. The ruling obviously took issue with the safeguards which the court feels are not there at the moment, for the reasons outlined, that, irrespective of whether the committee was established by the Minister, the Minister can disregard the decision that was taken. That is what the ruling found against. The court did not take issue with the ability of the Minister to revoke certain certificates of citizenship, so in these amendments tonight, we are not creating a new two-tiered system. This is a law that has already existed since the 1950s, which I would say has been used sparingly. I cannot imagine that these changes will suddenly mean that we have a massive increase in these types of cases in future.

I do not want people to think this is us being tougher on issues concerning migration or citizenship. In fact, this was brought to Cabinet a number of weeks ago, in the same week there were citizenship ceremonies. It was portrayed by some as the ability for the Minister to revoke someone's citizenship because they committed a crime or he or she did not like them. All the while, that week I had the pleasure of providing citizenship to 10,000 people. This is in no way an attempt by me or anybody else to look as though we are hardening or taking a different approach to these matters. This is simply an important amendment to reflect the judgment and ruling. It was a number of years ago but there are any number of judgments, cases or amendments in my Department at any given time that could all be put into a miscellaneous Bill but obviously they take time and a lot of effort. Other work is under way. One has to choose, eventually draw a line and bring a Bill forward. If we can bring forward additional amendments, we do so. That is exactly what I did in this case. It is important to make these changes and that the Minister for Justice has this right to revoke citizenship in the most serious of cases. As I said, we are not talking about someone not being our kind of person. This is where someone poses a security risk to our State, where they obtained citizenship through fraudulent means. We are talking about a former judge of the Circuit Court, High Court, Court of Appeal or Supreme Court. I do not accept the idea that members of our superior courts would be in cahoots with or engage with the Minister, at the behest and request of the Minister, depending on the original decision. There is a clear separation of powers. We have a very well-respected Judiciary. Any individual from any of those courts I mentioned-----

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