Seanad debates
Thursday, 20 November 2003
Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Second Stage.
The Bar Council tells us there is no clarity in the modus operandi of the PIAB. It is a question of how legislation is drafted. I am sure the members of the Bar Council know better than anybody that the worst legislation is legislation which attempts to anticipate a specific case such as an elephant walking into a court. The Bill before the House is enabling legislation. We have produced a document, A Lay Person's Guide to the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, to indicate roughly how the new structure will work. By "modus operandi" I presume the council means the detail of the board's operations. The Bill requires the board to outline the various steps in its operations. The board will have to ensure all of the rights referred to by the eminent members of the Bar Council are protected in the course of its proceedings. That will happen. There are reasons the process is not included in the legislation. One of the most important is that the operation of the board will, of its nature, be organic. There will be issues of learning through the experience of making marginal changes. This happens in the courts and elsewhere. There will be different emphases in the process as things develop. With experience, it will become clear that certain aspects of the board's operations require different approaches, which is as it should be.
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