Joanna Tuffy (Labour)

I move amendment No. 17:

In page 49, line 41, after "admissible" insert ", provided that no statement insofar as it consists of or includes a statement controverted by the defendant in proceedings shall be admissible under this section unless the defendant was afforded the opportunity to exercise the rights referred to in subsection (10)(a)".

The section purports to make all statements admissible and a court can simply take into account whether a cross-examination was allowed. This is inappropriate as the right to cross-examine is a constitutional right as seen in a previous example re Haughey. Controversial statements must be inadmissible unless there is a right to cross-examine. We raised this issue on Committee Stage.

The purpose of amendment No. 18 is to rectify a legal error in the section. Whether the section applies is a legal matter which the court should decide. It is not a factual matter which depends on the existence of reasonable grounds for belief. The section does not specifically afford the defendant a reasonable time following service to arrange for travel to the other state. The Minister objected to 14 days in the previous wording of our amendment, but this has been deleted. I would like to hear his comments on the amendments.