Seanad debates
Wednesday, 18 June 2003
European Convention on Human Rights Bill 2001: Second Stage.
It seems that we needed to be courageous but that we were not. We needed to take either the legal or the constitutional route, perhaps both, and declined to do so. We have improved the process but not the rights. As several speakers have said, we have left very limited remedies. I am also disappointed at the ungenerous limit of one year's retrospection provided for in the Bill. I would have thought that at least three years would have been a reasonably generous compromise. One year is about as short as one could get away with without being accused of trivialising matters. That is disappointing. The Bill is welcome as far as it goes but does not do what we should have done. For that reason, I must record my disappointment.
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