Results 1,741-1,760 of 4,915 for speaker:Jim O'Keeffe

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: That is the problem.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: I am knocked down by all the support I am getting in principle for the propositions I am suggesting. However, I am not having much success in securing the changes in the law which I feel are necessary. We need to go back to first principles when considering these issues. The first point is that we constitute the Legislature. I respect the independence of the courts, but my first job is to...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: The case itself is ludicrous. Three of the six judges held that everything was okay and the trial judge decided the warrant was valid. When the matter was passed to the Supreme Court, the majority of its members — I respect them and acknowledge they are entitled to have a view — stated that a conscious and deliberate violation of the constitutional rights of the accused person had taken...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: That goes back to 1990. It may be inappropriate for a country attorney like me to question the views of the learned judges of the Supreme Court, but I am supported by two strong dissenting opinions within the court. I am also supported in general by the Minister——

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: ——who no doubt will adorn the Bench when he has run his course here.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: We will consider him. We have to get back to first principles. It is easy to suggest that constitutional rights are being trampled on. I do not believe that is the case in this instance. I am proposing that questions of this nature should be examined in the round, that any conscious violation of rights should be prohibited and that things should be done in a bona fide manner. Such an...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: He sounds like an eminently sensible judge.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: The Minister should promote that judge.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: I find myself smothered by support from Fianna Fáil, the Progressive Democrats, my colleague, Deputy Howlin and Sinn Féin. There is a common view in favour of the proposal. I accept this is a complex issue. Until I have the support of all parties in the House I withdraw the amendment in light of the limited time available. Perhaps we can resume the discussion on Report Stage.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: The case made is a good one. I suggest to the Tánaiste that the formulation Deputy Howlin has outlined better captures what is intended and I support his amendment.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: As regards the lines, if paragraphs (e) and (f) are taken out, (g) will have to come up. Does that happen automatically?

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: I have been looking at the section not from a critical viewpoint because I like the idea involved. Perhaps now is the time to try to find holes in it, however. What if the person charged is illiterate, if that is the politically correct term, and unable to produce a written statement? It must also be signed by the applicant. I have occasionally come across cases where an individual has...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: They would not have to be included in the list for a bail application.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: That is what would happen in practice.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: I have always accepted the position that a chief superintendent or a member of the Garda Síochána could have an opinion as to whether somebody was a member of, say, the IRA. I was always happy to have that opinion accepted and taken into account by the court because it was an opinion as to fact. I can see what the Minister is trying to get at here but he is going about it the wrong way....

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: It is an opinion that somebody will commit a crime and I question how it can be expressed to be evidence as it stands logic on its head. If the Tánaiste were defending the applicant for bail, the first question he would ask would be which serious offence was in mind.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (Resumed) (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: It is a case that the person is of a criminal nature and could commit any offence. I recommend the Tánaiste goes back to the drawing board. I see his point and I support the idea but to suggest that a chief superintendent having a general view that an applicant for bail would commit any offence in the future and regarding this as evidence of the fact, is turning the English language on its...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: I am shocked by the Minister's response. The issue of electronic tagging has already being debated during the Criminal Justice Act 2006. Amendments at the time, some of which I was involved with, provided for a process whereby, on a post-release basis from custody, a judge could order a criminal to be electronically tagged for a certain period. Apparently nothing whatever has been done by...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: ——or was it genuinely to put in place a system that will be operative under the orders of the court? The Minister has accepted that pressure has been exerted very much by me and the Fine Gael Party on this issue to provide for the necessary statutory underpinning, but apparently he has done nothing to implement it. I do not intend to go over the ground of outlining the benefits of...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Committee Stage (29 Mar 2007)

Jim O'Keeffe: It is much less than the cost of keeping a person in prison.