Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

Article 34 of the convention provides for the right of individuals to apply to the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg in cases where they claim to be victims of alleged violations of convention rights. This is the right of individual petition. The related Article 35 of the convention enables the court to deal with such cases only after all domestic remedies are exhausted and within a time limit of six months.

The convention entered into force almost 50 years ago and Ireland and Sweden were the only contracting states which accepted this important right of individual petition. That has been our unvarying practice ever since. It is something with which the State has engaged itself in international law. We have always accepted this right of our citizens and it is not at issue in this legislation. The legislation does not affect the current position in any way because the practice has been established. As a matter of individual obligation, our citizens have always been permitted to make an individual application to the court at Strasbourg.

At the time, the thinking on international jurisprudence was that the sovereignty and equality of the state should be paramount and that nationals should not be allowed to invoke the protection of international tribunals against the sovereignty of a particular state. Ireland, along with Sweden, was one of the first states to disagree with this. We laid our marker in that respect many years ago. The Minister outlined yesterday the ten cases which have already been instituted and taken in Strasbourg.

The Bill provides for cases under the convention being taken before our courts. However, that in no way prejudices or interferes with the right of individual petition to Strasbourg, under the provisions of Article 34, if a person so wishes. Our original acceptance of the right of individual petition to the court remains in full effect. The international law on the matter is self-executing in our law. It does not require to be added to by express statutory restatement. It is an international provision, one of the first of its kind in the world, to which the State undertook to be bound before an international tribunal in respect of its own citizens.