Martin Mansergh (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister of State and greet what I consider major legislation. The European Convention on Human Rights is a radical document. We must remember this when charges of conservatism are made. Ireland has a very good record, as detailed by the Minister, regarding the convention, in particular, in allowing the right of individual appeal from the beginning. My colleague, Senator Feeney, in her very short contribution, put her finger on the Bill's essence. I paraphrase her words. It incorporates directly into Irish jurisprudence – though perhaps not the courts or the Constitution – the Convention on Human Rights in order that, when cases are considered, sections 2 and 3 of the Bill, in particular, will require the systematic interpretation of cases in the light of the State's obligations under the convention. The same goes for the organs of State. That is, in anyone's terms, a major advance.

It was a privilege to be here during the Minister's speech. All of us who know him or have listened to him will know that he has given a tremendous amount of thought and care to this subject and that he is tremendously exercised in a creative way by the tensions between and compatibility of European conventions and law and Irish law. What he is doing is in keeping with the wishes of the people. I had to address a forum on Europe a few nights ago in Sligo. One of the matters about which people are concerned right across the board is alleged loss of sovereignty. One can argue, as I did, that very often sharing sovereignty means enhancing rather than losing it. The care evident in this approach protects our sovereignty in order that when a breach is determined or identified, the Government and the Legislature will decide how it is to be repaired. I do not have the same fears as expressed by some speakers on the other side of the House to the extent that it means that the Government or Legislature might do nothing or something minimalist. This country has been a good international citizen, and if we inadvertently discover that we are in breach of our obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights – it has happened rarely – our record is that we try to repair that breach fully.

This legislation is obviously a consequence of the Good Friday Agreement. Obviously, there is asymmetry between the legal and constitutional situations north and south of the Border. What we signed up to in the Agreement was carefully expressed. It did not state directly that we would incorporate this but that the Government would take steps to further strengthen the protection of human rights in its jurisdiction and bring forward measures to strengthen and underpin the constitutional protection of human rights. The Agreement went on to state that those proposals would draw on the European Convention on Human Rights and other instruments and that the question of the incorporation of the convention would be further examined in that context, with the aim of ensuring at least an equivalent level of protection of human rights as that pertaining in Northern Ireland.

In general, protection of human rights in this jurisdiction has been far ahead of that in Northern Ireland. This is not merely a parliamentary democracy but a constitutional democracy. I have been following with some interest recent political manoeuvres across the water about the existence of the Lord Chancellor and the Law Lords interfering with the separation of powers.