David Norris (Independent)

I welcome the flexible attitude displayed by the Minister on Committee Stage. It seemed to me that he was showing good will towards many of the points that were raised in the House on that occasion. I support these amendments. Amendment No. 1 is very important because if applicants do not have access to some clear understanding of the guidelines and criteria that are being applied, it places them in a Kafkaesque situation. I am sure the Minister would regard that as regrettable.

The other amendments refer to a backlog of approximately 11,500 persons. In terms of legal administration that is an enormous number of people, but it is not a vast amount compared to the overall population. One must bear these two ideas in mind. If they all choose to go through the legal appeals process, the cost to the State could be well over €100 million, which could be much better spent.

Behind these amendments there are suggestions that an amnesty should be granted. I am not sure if a total amnesty should be granted, however, because the State is entitled to determine if some of these applicants might have a serious criminal record. That would be a reason for excluding them and, therefore, I would not support a general amnesty. We should find a mechanism for shifting this backlog and providing natural justice to those applicants, some of whom have been in the State for quite a number of years. None of them, apparently, has received a reply from the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform during the past two years. We do owe them something if they have reasonably good cases.

With regard to the appeals issue referred to in amendment No. 4, the Minister is, of course, entrusted with the decision-making in the first place. However, it does seem odd to appeal that decision to the same person because it is a kind of new case. The Minister is familiar with the legal doctrine that one cannot be judge in one's own case. The idea of not having an appeal mechanism, except to the same authority that decided in the first place, comes very close to the notion of being a judge in one's own case. I ask the Minister to examine this matter also.