Seanad debates
Tuesday, 24 June 2003
European Convention on Human Rights Bill 2001: Report and Final Stages.
It also raises the question, however, of whether this is constitutional. If a thing is defined in the Constitution in a certain way and then we give a different definition in a legislative proposal, does that impugn the constitutionality of the legislation? I do not know. It is a technical question and I am not sure if the Minister of State and his advisers will have an answer at hand. If they have, I would be very glad to hear it because it seems that where there is a conflict between the Constitution and the law, the Constitution wins. I would regard that as obvious. In particular, the Irish version of the Constitution wins. We have the supreme legislative document which is the Constitution of Ireland. I do not know if this causes a problem.
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