Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

This section applies to a citizen of Ireland or a person who is ordinarily resident in Ireland. If we are to assert extra-territorial jurisdiction, under the Constitution we are obliged to so in accordance with ordinary principles of international law. One of them is that there must be some link to the State. A citizen owes a duty of loyalty to the State under Article 9 of the Constitution. A person who is ordinarily resident in this country owes a different set of duties. That is a tangible link.

We cannot have a law in Ireland that allows us to prosecute an Australian for something they did in Thailand because it comes to our attention from a newspaper report. Normally, the citizen would have to be arrested in Ireland. There could be an extradition of an Irish citizen in certain circumstances where they were unlikely to be prosecuted abroad, but that is most unlikely. The truth is that this is most likely to arise in a sex tourism situation. The Attorney General's advice is that there must be a legal connection between the offence and this State before we can assume extra-territorial jurisdiction. That means the perpetrator in cases of sex tourism must have some linkage to the State. Ordinary residence or citizenship is sufficient. We cannot think of some other basis on which Ireland would purport to exercise extra territorial jurisdiction.